


and seek your starlight

by headlong



Series: even my own heart [2]
Category: Ensemble Stars! (Video Game)
Genre: Character Study, Developing Relationship, M/M, Post-Canon, Relationship Study
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-03
Updated: 2019-08-03
Packaged: 2020-07-29 20:51:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 27,707
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20088589
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/headlong/pseuds/headlong
Summary: Facing pressure from his mother about his love life, Tsumugi asks Natsume to look into his future, and see if he's destined to meet his partner soon. The reading he receives suggests he'll encounter them before his twentieth birthday -- which is exciting, but there are a couple of tiny problems.One: that's in just three weeks time. And two: there's no way the reading doesn't point to Tenshouin Eichi.





	and seek your starlight

**i. rain season**

The sky today is grey, overcast. Tsumugi power-walks his way home from the train station, huddled unhappily into himself, hands stuffed into his pockets and chin tucked against his chest. He had managed to forget an umbrella on his way out this morning, lulled into complacency by the temporarily clear skies, and it’s come back to bite him with a vengeance. His glasses are blurry with rain, his clothes are stuck to his skin, and his hair’s frizzed up completely. All in all, it’s a fairly miserable experience.

Miserable – and entirely preventable, because it always rains this time of year. Most July days, he wakes up to a sky thick with cloud, promising rain; and even on the mornings he doesn’t, it’s a certain bet that he’ll emerge from the office to a grey evening, sharpened at the edges and stripped of all colour. And it isn’t a gentle rain, either, but a merciless downpour. Considering he’s lived in the same city since before his parents’ divorce, he really should have learned that by now.

Luckily, the walk is only a few minutes long. And it’s not raining right now, the weather offering him some respite, even though the sky is still looking ominous. So he takes advantage of that to pick up his pace, hurrying as much as he dares. The neighbourhood he’s in is quiet, unexciting, and strikes a good balance between affordability and distance from the city centre. The rent would maybe be manageable on his own, if a little tight, but it’s fairly comfortable divided with a housemate. (A housemate who, granted, might get paid more than he does, but has correspondingly more expensive taste. So it balances out, mostly.)

Tsumugi’s house is an apartment on the second floor of a three-storey building. Nothing too fancy, but it’s home. He takes the stairs up, heedless of the puddles he splashes through, and altogether too eager to get inside.

Nobody’s around to intercept him, and it doesn’t take long before he comes to a stop outside apartment 203. His keys are, of course, in the last place he looks: his breast pocket, which is expected if somewhat unusual, because he usually keeps them in one of the pockets of his pants. But at least they’re here, which admittedly isn’t always the case. Then he takes off his jacket for good measure, shakes it out in the desperate hope of being able to dry it a little. When it remains no less drenched, he sighs, and lets himself in.

It’s dark inside, even though it’s only early evening, and his eyes take a moment to adjust. He flicks on the entryway light, recoiling when he accidentally blinds himself a little. Blinks heavily to clear the afterimages.

“Natsume,” he calls, toeing off his wet shoes, “I’m home!”

That doesn’t get a response, which could really mean anything. Maybe his housemate is wearing headphones, or maybe he’s in his room, or maybe he just isn’t here at all. All things considered, it’s a little unproductive. He makes a note to raise it whenever it is he sees Natsume next.

The pair of them are living together while Sora finishes his last year of high school, which has been a surprisingly smooth arrangement thus far, despite everything. Natsume’s working as a fortune teller, Tsumugi’s busy at all hours with his idol agency, and every now and then, they pair up to do promotional work for Switch. They can’t really debut, not without Sora, but they can lay a lot of groundwork between the two of them.

As for what their relationship actually  _ is_… well. They’re definitely friends by this point, even if Natsume’s never actually admitted as much. They wouldn’t be living together if that wasn’t true, no matter how much his housemate insists the arrangement is purely for convenience. And even before they made the promise which bound them together, Tsumugi’s always known he doesn’t want to be parted from him, and that he wants to work to make their happiness one and the same. He just doesn’t have any kind of frame of reference for what that means. So, in the end, Natsume is just Natsume to him, and maybe knowing that is enough.

He pads through the house, and ultimately concludes that Natsume’s probably not here. The sky outside is dark with rain, but none of the lights are on, and the quiet is almost eerie. So, in the end, Tsumugi peels himself out of his wet clothes, changes into something warm and dry, and settles himself in the main room. It doesn’t really matter one way or the other if he waits for Natsume to come back, but he likes the ritual of it. And he’d welcome the company; he’s still a little put out from being rained on, and even after months, he hasn’t lost the novelty of living with someone who’s actually interested in his existence. (As much as Natsume may still try to pretend he isn’t.)

He doesn’t have to sit around for long. It can’t be more than ten minutes before he hears the click of a key in the front door, a shuffling coming from the entryway, a familiar set of footfalls. And then his housemate sweeps in, all grace.

Unlike Tsumugi, who’d arrived home looking and feeling like a drowned cat, Natsume seems to have passed through the weather unscathed. The only sign that he’s just walked through a rainstorm is the slight frizz of his hair, and even that probably wouldn’t be obvious to anyone who doesn’t live with him. Still, there’s a general exhaustion to his stance, and he doesn’t usually let himself in so heavily. His eyes flick to Tsumugi, and narrow slightly, as if he’s weighing up what to say. At last, he purses his lips and speaks.

“I’m Back.”

“Welcome home.” Tsumugi stands, heads over to the kettle. “Tea?”

Natsume collapses into a seat at the dining table. “Please.”

So Tsumugi fills the kettle, and flicks the switch for it to boil. Fishes out Natsume’s favourite mug, the one with cats on it, and dumps a teabag – black – inside. Then he scrounges around in the pantry for the packet of biscuits he remembers seeing there; Natsume always complains about drinking tea without something solid to accompany it, and he’s been far too busy to bake lately, so he’s going to have to settle for these.

Once he sets the biscuits on the table, he moves onto preparing the tea itself. Natsume likes it best plain, perfectly black; no milk, or sugar, or honey, or lemon, or anything else he’s heard of as an accompaniment. Which means it’s a simple matter to fill the cup from the kettle, and to pour himself a glass of water to match. By the time he turns back around, a drink in each hand, Natsume’s already stress-eaten two biscuits, and is getting to work on a third.

“Here you are.”

Natsume accepts his tea, but doesn’t offer anything in return besides a nod of thanks. Which is fairly unusual behaviour; even now, he almost never misses an opportunity to take aim at his senior. And there’s something in the cant of his brows, and the tension in the lines of his mouth, and the absence in his eyes, which suggests that maybe all isn’t well.

“If something’s bothering you, we can talk about it.”

“What makes you think there Is?”

Because Tsumugi’s learned a modicum of tact over the last two years, contrary to what some might insist, he doesn’t point out that his housemate is obviously sulking. “It’s because we spend so much time together. I think I’ve learned to read your moods by now, at least a little.”

Natsume curls his hands around the mug, warming them. Tsumugi, happy to be patient, tries not to watch him too obviously.

“All Right,” he says at last, about two minutes and another biscuit later. “So. You recall that I was booked to make an appearance on a talk show Today, don’t You?”

“I remember, yes.”

“Well, I thought I knew what questions they were going to ask Me, but then the host started going off Script. I do know how to improvise a Little, so that on its own wasn’t Unfixable, but some of the things she was asking went over the boundaries we’d discussed in Advance. So, although I had told her that asking about my personal life was strictly off Limits, that lasted all of three Seconds. And she had the absolute audacity to ask if I was seeing Anyone.”

“Oh,” Tsumugi says. And then, mostly on dumb reflex, “Well, are you?”

Natsume casts him an absolutely withering look. “What kind of inane question is That? Surely you’d have noticed if that were the Case.”

“I mean, I suppose I might have been able to guess if you’d brought someone home? But I wouldn’t expect you to have gone out of your way to tell me, or anything.”

“Unbelievable.”

“Huh?”

“Never Mind.” Natsume takes the teabag out and drops it on the biscuit plate, then takes a tentative sip. “You’ve gotten better at preparing This, Lately.”

“Well, tea is fairly simple… and you take yours simply, Natsume. I don’t need to remember how much milk or sugar you want, or what ratio you want them in. And I like being able to remember the way you like things, too.”

“Hm,” Natsume says, whatever that might mean, and drinks a little more of his tea.

The room goes quiet – quiet enough that when the rain starts up again, even lightly, it’s almost deafening. Natsume looks like he doesn’t want to return to their previous topic, and not just because his face is buried in his drink. Which Tsumugi can respect, even if he’s suddenly, impossibly curious about why Natsume is being so cagey, and well aware that he doesn’t have the licence to ask. But the topic of personal lives snags in his brain, and reminds him of something more important he’d meant to address.

“Oh, actually. I wanted to ask if you could do me a favour, and look into the future on my behalf. And I’ll pay you, of course, if you’d like. I don’t mind the details of how it happens.”

Natsume purses his lips, frowns, leans back in his chair. His mug makes a solid sound as he sets it on the table. “Don’t even Bother. I’ll offer you a special housemate Discount, one time Only.”

“Housemate?” Tsumugi echoes. It doesn’t hurt, exactly, but it still strikes him as a little cold. “Is that really my best deal here?”

“Well, would you prefer the coworker Discount? That’s much more Commonplace, considering how many others are at our Agency. And with that Option, you’d still have to pay the Difference.”

“Like I said, though, I wouldn’t mind paying –”

“Be Quiet, you scruffy Idiot, and learn to take a Hint. I’m saying that I’ll do it for Free.”

“Oh. Well, only if you’re sure?”

“Quite. Now, tell me what it is that ails You – that makes you come to a fortune teller for Help.”

“Well, I went to see my mother after work, and lately she’s decided to take an interest in my life again… and in particular, she keeps asking when I’m going to meet somebody and settle down. Because my brother got married to the girl he was dating in high school, and she’s turned her focus onto me.”

Natsume snorts. “Doesn’t she realise you're an Idol? It’s unthinkable for you to have that kind of Relationship, even if we haven’t properly made our debut Yet. Also – aren’t you still too young to think about that kind of Thing?”

Those are both valid concerns. But Tsumugi’s far more worried about the fact he’s never been interested in a woman in his life. It must be bound to happen someday, though, if he keeps applying himself. He’s always been a late bloomer, anyway.

(As if any woman in the world could hold a candle to Tenshouin Eichi.)

“You’re right, of course. But still, I was hoping you might be able to do a love reading for me. Because I’d like to bring her some good news, if I can, even if I can’t actually introduce her to my future wife yet.”

Weirdly, Natsume eyes him up for a long moment before he says anything. And when he speaks, there’s something a little sharp in his tone – well, there always is, but this particular knife-edge is new. “You realise I’m much more than a cheap Horoscope, don’t You? My fortunes are incredibly Accurate, and not everyone is equipped to deal with the details I can provide Them. So, Senpai, I’ll ask again just to make Sure: do you really wish for me to gaze into the future on your Behalf?”

“I do. I’m asking you because I trust your ability, after all.”

“Well… all Right. Then I’m going to fetch the things I Need.”

He stands up and heads towards his room. In his absence, Tsumugi tidies the kitchen, and then sits back down to wait.

Natsume re-emerges only a minute or two later, carrying a large crystal ball wrapped in cloth. The base peeks out from the bottom, woven in silver filigree. He has a number of different ones, Tsumugi knows, but tends to fall back on this particular one for most readings. It was the first one he ever owned, and he trusts it the most; it was a gift from his mother, as soon as he began to show psychic ability, and he treasures it more than just about anything. He sets it down gently on the kitchen table, then whisks off the cloth with a flourish to reveal the crystal underneath. Its depths are inscrutable, unknowable. Reflecting nothing.

“Stop gaping like a Fish,” Natsume says, and Tsumugi comes back to himself. “If you’re certain you want to go through with a Reading, then we’re going to do it Properly. Go dim the lights and draw the Curtains.”

By the time he’s finished doing that, Natsume’s produced an array of candles from some hiding place in the pantry, and laid them out on the table. He lights them one at a time, and the scent of different herbs fills the air. Tsumugi takes his seat opposite, watching the play of firelight on Natsume’s face.

“You didn’t have to go all-out on the atmosphere for me, you know.”

“It isn’t about You. I find it easier to focus when I’m in this kind of Environment, regardless of my Client.”

“Oh. I don’t think I knew that.”

“You never Asked.”

“Well, it definitely feels kind of occult in here. But it’s a little nostalgic, too. Like we’re in the secret room in the underground archives again.”

“Don’t get sentimental on Me.”

“Then I must be wording it badly. What I mean is, I always feel like I’m caught in a different world, somehow, when it’s raining. A world where I might be the only one who exists, even if I’m safely indoors. And the dark and the candles make me feel even more like I’m… somewhere that isn’t here.”

For a long moment, the rain outside is his only answer. He half-expects some roll of thunder to intrude on them, or some uncanny breeze to sweep in and snuff out the lights, warning them once and for all that this is a terrible idea. But nothing of the sort happens, and the strange tension that’s snaked its way between them goes unbroken. Natsume turns a pale yellow candle between his thin fingers.

“Good. Because – this reading is supposed to show you the way toward your Future. Not be the product of some Miserable, worn-out Sentiment.”

It’s always difficult to pick out when he’s being particularly serious, but this time, Tsumugi thinks he might be. There’s just something about the particular twang of his voice which suggests it, a kind of flatness to his vowels. “It isn’t, but why do you sound so unhappy about the idea? I know neither of us has the most idyllic past, but that doesn’t mean I can just forget about it, or that there aren’t parts worth remembering. And I was always happy in the archives, with you.”

“I don’t want to talk about this right Now, and you need to stop being so difficult Anyway. If you keep arguing with Me, you’re going to throw me Off, and then I won’t be able to perform the divination you Requested.”

“I didn’t mean to be difficult, though.”

“That doesn’t Matter. You’re somebody who gets underfoot Regardless, whether you mean to or Not.”

“Oh.”

Natsume sighs. It makes some of the candles gutter dangerously, but none go out. “It wasn’t intended As – Look, can we get on with the reading Already? The longer we Talk, the less smoothly this is going to Go.”

And that’s really the crux of the whole thing, isn’t it: that the pair of them get along well, enough to still be this close, right up until they actually speak to each other. Tsumugi makes himself drag his eyes up to his housemate’s face. “You’re right, I think. How should we begin?”

“Focus your Energy, and ask your question of me once More.”

“Okay. Well, I’d like to ask about what’s in store for my love life. I want to know about my future partner, if I have one, and what they’re like… and if I’ll be able to meet them soon.”

Natsume mutters an incantation under his breath, peers into the depths of the crystal ball. Tsumugi follows his gaze, too, but he can’t manage to make anything out. Not that he had expected to, because he already knows he lacks the talent to perform divination himself, but it would still be nice to see something.

“Sorry,” Natsume mutters after a moment. His hands are steady, but his eyes are screwed up in something that looks a lot like pain. “It’s just taking a little longer than it normally Would, for some Reason.”

“Are you all right?”

“Fine,” he snaps. “I just have a slight Headache, but it isn’t Important.”

“Really, please don’t push yourself on my account –”

“Shut up and let me Focus! I’m not some amateur who runs from a Challenge.”

“I didn’t mean to suggest you were, though?”

“Just be  _ quiet_.”

Tsumugi falls silent. The furrow of Natsume’s brows casts his face into even deeper shadow, but his eyes glint like points of light.

“Ah, it’s beginning to come into Focus. First of all, I see… the old made New. Maybe the return of an old Flame, or a friend or acquaintance seen in a new Light. Of a similar age and Standing, if not slightly Above.” He squints, flexes his fingers slightly, as if to dispel the clouds inside. “But I’m also getting a sense of… Earthiness. Stability, either financial or Personal. They’re someone who can provide for You.”

“Is there anything else?”

“I’m working on It. The impression I’m getting is that it’s somebody… Tall. And likely Fair. But that’s all the detail I can See.”

“And. Um. You don’t have to worry too hard about this, but can you tell when I’m going to meet them?”

“Sooner rather than Later. As the second decade of your life draws to a Close, and you move into the Third.”

“So, before twenty,” he repeats, head spinning. “Natsume, are you completely sure about that?”

“Of course I Am. I’ve been reading fortunes since I was Young, so I think I know what I’m Doing.”

“It’s just… I’m twenty next month.”

That breaks the spell, and the atmosphere changes in an instant. Natsume’s eyes snap sharply up to him, the force of them unexpected after the reading.

“So you Are,” he says, “aren’t You.”

“Which is why I was going to say, that doesn’t sound right at all. I trust you, but it kind of seems like a long shot that I’m going to run into my soulmate in the next three weeks.”

Natsume’s scowl deepens. “But that makes it sound like you  _ don’t _ trust Me. At least make up your Mind, you ridiculous Mophead. Are You, or aren’t You, doubting the accuracy of my Reading?”

“No, like I keep saying, not at all!” Tsumugi waves his hands desperately, and tries to turn his thoughts into something coherent. “It’s just… that sounds like somebody’s destiny, but not mine. It’s true I can’t read the future, and I wouldn’t be any good at it if I could, but I can’t imagine anything like that for myself.”

“Well, it’s all Real. I’m very glad for You. Congratulations.”

“When you say it like that, it doesn’t sound like you’re wishing me well at all.”

“I,” Natsume grits out, sounding like the words are being wrenched from between his teeth, “think you should be happy.”

“But?”

“There isn’t a But.”

He’s usually so straightforwardly bad-tempered that it’s strange to see him bordering on actually upset. But no matter how Tsumugi turns the problem over in his mind, he can’t see a way to resolve things that doesn’t necessitate prying, and he absolutely doesn’t want to force this into a real confrontation. “Well… if you say so. You don’t have to worry about me abandoning you and Switch, though, if that’s what you’re worried about.”

“Switch,” Natsume repeats. “You think this is about  _ Switch_?”

“You think if I get into a – a relationship, I’ll end up neglecting my work and dreams, right? But I won’t let that happen. A long time ago, I told you that I think my happiness and yours are the same, and I still mean that. I won’t let them diverge.”

“This is absolutely a Divergence!”

“Not really? And if that isn’t it, you need to tell me what you mean, or otherwise I won’t understand. So… if there’s something you want to say to me, please say it.”

Natsume draws in a slow, deep breath, but Tsumugi can hear its shuddery edges. “It's nothing,” he says at last. “I have things to Do.”

“All… right?”

So Natsume hides his crystal ball under its cloth again, blows out the candles. With those lights gone, there’s nothing left; even the gap in the curtains is useless, sunset muted by the July rainclouds. But he still cuts a clear silhouette as he scoops up his things and turns to leave.

“Have a good Night,” he says stiffly. His head is craned to one side, but it’s impossible to tell what he’s thinking. He might be looking back over his shoulder, or he might not, eyes invisible in the absence of light. “I hope… that this does lead you to your happiness.”

And Tsumugi is left alone with the darkness, and the sound of endless rain, and the faint scent of smoke, and the sinking feeling that he’s supposed to be more excited about all of this than he is.

*

Natsume’s already out of the house by the time Tsumugi wakes up the next day. That isn’t at all like him; if he doesn’t have anything on, he usually goes to bed so late that he sleeps through half the morning – especially on a weekend. And after the strange tension last night, it definitely feels like a bad sign.

He shuffles around the kitchen, fixes himself a cup of tea and some toast. There’s no point trying to track Natsume down, even if he wanted to be found, and Tsumugi frankly wouldn’t know where to start looking anyway. It isn’t raining, this morning, but the sky definitely threatens it. And he’ll come back when he’s good and ready, even if the waiting might be rough.

At least Tsumugi has plenty of things to occupy him, in the meantime. Like finishing his breakfast, or the leftover paperwork he couldn’t finish yesterday, or mending the rip Sora tore in his practice clothes, or the calendar on the fridge, open to the month of July.

He stands and paces over to it, almost against his will. So… he’s supposed to meet his soulmate before he turns twenty? If that’s the case, it’s possible he’s already made plans to see them – especially considering that the reading suggested it’s someone he knows.

Taking a closer look, though, his arrangements for the next month, in blue pen, are far fewer and less exciting than Natsume’s, in red. That includes his work schedule, always at the same days and times; some coffee and lunch arrangements with old Yumenosaki friends, from both his old grade and the grade below; one or two joint appearances with Natsume, alternating red letters with blue; Switch practices, in vibrant green, but all in Tsumugi’s own handwriting. And then, in huge print in the first week of August, on the day before his birthday:  _ EICHI PARTY. _

Tsumugi’s known Eichi for a long time, now. They’ve seen each other a few times since graduation, when their schedules manage to line up for more than two seconds. But it’s new of him to invite Tsumugi along to an event, to be held at the Tenshouin estate, the kind of party which will leave him feeling exactly as common as he is. Although he’s fretted back and forth about it, Tsumugi’s ultimately managed to talk himself into going for the sake of work; the Tenshouin family know everyone who’s anyone in the Japanese entertainment world, and he’ll be able to forge useful connections for both himself and his agency. But, when it boils down to it, that isn’t his real motivating factor. Because it may not be karaoke, and it may be years too late, but, well, Eichi’s trying. The least Tsumugi can do is reciprocate.

Idly, he flips the calendar to July again, then back to August. Thinks about Natsume’s prophecy; wonders where, amongst these letters and numbers, these strokes of blue pen, he’s supposed to chance upon love. Freezes as a seductive, traitorous thought crosses his mind.

What if it’s Eichi.  _ What if. _

The concept makes his heart kick up, his breath spill out of him in a heavy rush. It ticks all the boxes that had been laid out in the reading, in a way that’s so obvious he should have seen it earlier: similar in age, the old made new, a sense of stability. He’s even taller than Tsumugi is, and paler. But his first thought isn’t  _ thank goodness, _ or  _ imagine if my younger self could see me now,_ or even  _ I wonder what it would be like for Eichi to love me back,_ but  _ Natsume isn’t going to like this. _

Regardless: there’s no way he can talk himself out of going now. His fate might lead to Eichi, or it might lead to someone else, but it almost certainly leads to that party.

Tsumugi pulls out his phone and opens his conversation with Eichi. He’d gotten a new model a couple of months ago, at his boss’s insistence, and lost a lot of his old messages, so his history is still fairly sparse. But in this particular conversation, there’s nothing there at all. Zero messages sent; zero messages received. The blank screen torments him with its silence.

And he could just… text Eichi. Not even about the love reading, and the fact their lives might be leading to each other; but to organise coffee, or a lunch arrangement, or even just to say hello. He’d be within his rights to, and he’d probably even get a decently quick response.

But it feels wrong to force things. If he and Eichi are meant to meet at the crossroads of destiny, they’re going to arrive there either way. And the idea still feels too strange, too completely intangible, for him to follow through on.

So he turns his phone off. Buries it deep in his pocket, where he can proceed with his day, try to forget about his fate and his cowardice. And there it sits, for hours – at least, until he receives a terse series of messages from Natsume, who’s at the supermarket, and wants to know if he needs anything, and could he please hurry up and tell him if so.

*

July rolls onward, and so does the calendar of Switch’s engagements. This time, they’ve been booked to perform at a local fireworks festival, an appearance secured through one of Tsumugi’s connections. It’s not a particularly long or formal set – six of their staple songs, with another planned as an encore – but it’s a chance to be onstage together, and that’s rare for them right now. Especially because it lets them reconnect with their fans; they’ve announced their appearance on social media, and it’s earnestly heartening to see how many of them have commented about planning to attend. And Tsumugi’s been working on their outfits, and Natsume’s been revising some of the choreography, and Sora’s been joining them almost every day to practice. It’s comfortable, and it’s easy.

Or it would be if Natsume wasn’t acting so  _ strange_ .

It probably doesn’t read as strangeness to anyone who doesn’t know him as well as Tsumugi – or, for that matter, Sora, who can pick up the mood of a room in an instant, and has been uncharacteristically withdrawn during their practices in response. But he’s always frowning, and not in his usual ambiently bad-tempered way. And he seems more irritable in general, short fuse somehow even shorter. And he sometimes gets a little sloppy during dance practice, which there isn’t really an excuse for, considering he’s their leader and most frequent centre. It’s a thousand tiny things, but they don’t stop piling up.

(Not that Tsumugi’s been helping, considering he’s been toying with his phone for the last week, and thinking about the message he shouldn’t write. And every time he glances up, he seems to meet Natsume’s eyes.)

Also, Natsume is definitely avoiding him.

It might not be obvious to someone who wasn’t looking for it. Natsume shows up to every practice, and interacts normally with him there – well, normally by his standards. But at home, their paths never seem to cross any more. It isn’t uncommon for the pair of them to both be in the lounge, doing their individual work in silent camaraderie, but that hasn’t been the case recently. Natsume’s always in his room instead, and his sleep pattern has shifted towards something more nocturnal. And it’s different from the way he gets when he’s busy with a big project, too. On nights when he’s up late working on something, he goes through at least two cups of coffee and a terrifying amount of snacks, and Tsumugi always wakes up to find the kitchen sink full of mugs and side plates. But lately, the sink has been empty, the pantry eerily untouched. And, more than once this week, Tsumugi had woken before six in the morning for work, and seen the lights still on under Natsume’s door when he’d passed by.

It all points to something being off, but he has no idea what. And they’re never in the same place at the same time long enough for him to ask, at least without undeservedly catching Sora in the crossfire.

So, Tsumugi messages him. He tries to phrase it as kindly and unconfrontationally as he can; a polite inquiry into how he’s doing, and an offer to talk through whatever’s bothering him. Natsume reads it, but doesn’t reply, and the timestamp dates from nearly four in the morning.

And with the honest approach ruled out, he has to resort to trickery. It doesn’t sit well with him, but he had made an earnest try at playing this fairly, and it seems like the only way of getting answers – and he isn’t unfamiliar with underhanded methods, even if they aren’t suited to the person he’s become.

The best time to ensnare Natsume, then, is going to be at practice, or any situation where Switch are all together: the one place Tsumugi knows he’s guaranteed to show up. And he gets the chance sooner than expected, just a few days later. Sora usually comes back to theirs for dinner after practice, because it’s important for them to spend time together in contexts that have nothing to do with work, but today he has an assignment to finish. Or so he claims; Sora’s only gotten sharper with age, and there’s no way he doesn’t know something is strange between them, even if they’re both acting normally during practice. So it’s entirely possible that homework is just an excuse to make an escape, employing tact he absolutely didn’t learn from either of his upperclassmen. Either way, he heads off, leaving the two of them to take care of the rest.

Not that there’s a palpable tension between them or anything, though. Natsume’s always so professional about their work as Switch, even when something’s clearly wrong. And that doesn’t  _ irk _ Tsumugi, exactly, because not much does, but it might be starting to.

He’d thought they were supposed to be closer than this, after all.

Their practice room is a dance studio belonging to Tsumugi’s agency, around the corner from the office building. Switch is probably going to be one of their bigger acts after Sora’s graduation, considering both their skill and the prestige Yumenosaki has been enjoying recently, so they get to enjoy a meaningful amount of the company’s resources. But that also means they have to take perfect care of the place, or else it reflects badly on them. So Natsume does a quick once-over of the room, ensuring that nothing’s damaged or out of place, and then moves to leave.

But Tsumugi places himself in front of the door, blocking his way out. That makes Natsume cast him a long, narrow look. It’s actually a fairly even match: Tsumugi’s height and weight advantage, versus the fact that if Natsume were to shove him aside, he wouldn’t be able to bring himself to retaliate.

“Senpai,” Natsume says, in the fake-pleasant tone that means he’s secretly furious, and barely managing to hold himself back. “Move.”

“I can’t do that, Natsume. Not until we talk about this.” He takes a deep breath, forces himself to hold eye contact. “Have you been avoiding me?

“I don’t know what you Mean.”

“Yes, you do. We never see each other outside of practice any more. Because if I did something to hurt you, then I’d at least like to know about it.”

“But that isn’t the Case. You didn’t do Anything.”

“Oh.”

“As strange as this might Sound, you’re in no way responsible for my bad mood as of Late. I’ve been occupied by things which have nothing to do with You.”

“Then, well – is everything all right?”

“I should be the one asking that Question. Is there a reason you’ve been in your own head so much Lately?”

“Huh? Oh, um… I didn’t realise.” It seems strange for Natsume to have noticed, when he’s been so caught up in his own issues, but Tsumugi supposes he’s never been terribly subtle himself. “But if you want to know the truth, I’ve been busy thinking about your love reading.”

“Of course you Have.” Natsume scowls. “I should have known agreeing to that was a bad Idea. You’re so simple-minded that of course you would fixate on It.”

“No, I promise it’ll be fine. It’s true I might be a little distracted for the next week or two, but as soon as I’ve met them, I’ll be right there with you again. But, anyway, since I’ve answered you, now it’s only fair for you to answer me.”

“I don’t believe I ever agreed to play fair where you’re Concerned.”

“Natsume.”

“Well, if you really aren’t going to let me wriggle out of this One… everything isn’t all Right, but it isn’t not all Right, Either. Still, it’s something I have to deal with Myself, and I have it under Control. I know it’s in your nature to meddle in Everything, But – don’t ask about It.” He exhales, the sound almost swallowed up by the tension. “Please.”

And Natsume so rarely asks anything from him, let alone with that degree of sincerity, that he has to let it slide. As little as he wants to, and as much as he knows that this is certainly leading to something worse.

“Okay. But… promise you’ll come to me if it gets worse.”

“I can’t do That.”

“I thought you might say as much,” he admits with a sigh. “I know it’s too much to expect you to ever take me up on that. But… I had to offer, and I wanted to. I only ever want to make your life better, you know.” 

The look in Natsume’s eyes is almost impossibly far away. “I Know.”

*

The performance at the fireworks festival goes okay, but it almost doesn’t. Switch have always been good at pulling themselves together at the last minute, at least; the issue is that, for a performance like this, they shouldn’t have to. And, of course, the issue is Natsume, and the fact that despite his insistence on taking care of things himself, he’s only become even more trapped in his own head.

Sora’s over again today, but they’re waiting on Natsume to actually begin doing anything useful. On weekends, the three of them usually meet at the apartment, and head to practice together. So it isn’t like Natsume to be late, especially since his room is maybe five metres down the hall. In the meantime, Tsumugi’s watching Sora play a game on one of the fifty consoles plugged into their TV. He’s grinding his way through an RPG, fighting waves of low-level monsters in the hopes of making a rare boss spawn, and commentating the whole time.

It’s good, and it’s comfortable. There’s something inherently warm about being around Sora, something which never fades, even two and a half years on. And while Tsumugi had initially never expected a future like this, playing the role of a mentor to someone who knows him for the person he is and not the person he used to be, he’s found that it suits him. So well, in fact, that it’s probably played a significant role in his choice to go into the business of producing idols. He might never have ended up here if he hadn’t been able to watch Sora grow, and to have the privilege of having a hand in that process. Because Sora might have been the talent that Natsume scouted, but he’s become impossibly dear to Tsumugi, too.

But suddenly, there’s the shuffle of footsteps, and then Natsume sticks his head into the main room. He looks the way he always does, but there’s something terrible and exhausted in his posture nevertheless. Then he mutters, “Practice is Cancelled,” and scuttles off again.

Tsumugi turns back to Sora, who’s watching him with large eyes, game completely forgotten. It’s always easy to feel like Sora knows more than he’s letting on, and somehow that sense has only intensified as he’s grown. He turned eighteen earlier this month, and he’s the tallest member of Switch by a good two inches, and he hasn’t been a child for a long time, but sometimes Tsumugi still feels like he needs to justify himself the way he would to a quietly disappointed son.

“I wish I knew what was going on with him,” he finds himself saying. “Because I think something might be really wrong.”

“Senpai and Master are good friends,” Sora says, frowning in a way that’s eerily reminiscent of Natsume, “and they live together. So of course Senpai has already asked. Right?”

“Um,” he says. “Sort of.”

“Senpai…”

“You know how Natsume is, though. He probably wouldn’t say anything honest to me, even if I did. And also… I feel like it might be my fault, somehow.”

“Why? Senpai always thinks other people’s problems are his fault, and they never are.”

“I know, but this time I’m sure that’s it. At least, I think things started to go south around the time I asked him to read my love fortune. I told you about that, didn’t I? Because I feel like he’s been avoiding me ever since, and I’m not sure why. But you’re right. I’m probably just overthinking this again.”

Sora draws his knees up to his chest, and gives him a long, flat look. “Master’s colour right now… Sora doesn’t think anything you could say to him would make it worse.”

“Oh. Is it really that bad?”

“It isn’t so bad it can’t be fixed! But it isn’t going to get fixed unless it’s looked at properly. If you’re worried about someone else, you should talk to them, and show them your feelings. That’s one of the magic spells Senpai taught Sora. It clears away illusions, and reveals the truth.”

“You’re right, of course.” He manages a laugh, but it feels strained and dusty. “I suppose I should try and play by my own rules more often.”

“Senpai’s rules and Master’s rules are different, even if they’re the same sometimes too, so it makes sense if Senpai forgets every now and then. Still, Sora thinks that Senpai needs to work this one out on his own, and that he needs to do it soon. But, if he wants a hint from Sora’s helpful Master strategy guide: the colour Master is giving off is mostly… lonely.”

“I’ll be fine. As much as I’d like a Natsume walkthrough sometimes, this feels like a problem I have to work out for myself.”

Sora gives him a bright, sunny smile, and it makes his stomach twist into itself. “Hehe, okay! Good luck, Senpai!”

It takes barely a few seconds for Tsumugi to make it from the lounge to Natsume’s room. Still, though, he hesitates. It should be easy to knock, and to start the process of bringing whatever miserable truths he’s hiding to light. Assuming Natsume’s cooperation, of course.

But, in practice, it’s difficult. It’s really, really difficult to make himself bite this particular bullet. The sounds of Sora’s game drift faintly down the corridor, an unfitting prelude to maybe the most important conversation he’s had in weeks.

Only the knowledge that things won’t get better unless he presses them spurs him to knock. There’s a long, long moment where Tsumugi catastrophises –  _ what am I going to do if he doesn’t answer, what if he didn’t hear me, what if I’ve already pushed us into a situation where this can’t be fixed _ – and then the lock clicks.

Natsume regards him through the sliver of open door. It’s impossible to see much of him, just a wary golden eye and his shadowed profile, but he definitely doesn’t seem pleased. “Senpai. What.”

“Can I come in?”

“I’m in the middle of something Important. Besides, unless it’s really that Private, we can talk out Here.”

“It isn’t private, exactly, but it’s definitely important too. So I’d rather not stand out in the hallway, if you don’t mind.”

He clicks his tongue, cracks the door open a little wider. “Fine, but only because I know I won’t be able to get you to leave me Alone. But make it Quick.”

Natsume’s room is a little bigger than Tsumugi’s, but he also brought much more with him when he moved in, so it checks out. On top of all of the ordinary bedroom furniture, it’s filled with the kind of paraphernalia one might expect from a magician slash fortune teller slash idol. There’s a section of his room dedicated to a collection of CDs, concert recordings, and general merchandise, like an ordinary boy might have. But it exists next to an entire bookshelf filled with the tools of his trade, crystal balls alongside neatly labelled jars of potion ingredients alongside books in languages Tsumugi can’t even begin to comprehend. Every time he visits, he gets caught up looking at something new, since it’s all so fascinating and alien – but he can’t afford to do that, today.

“So,” Natsume says flatly, watching him with an even less impressed face than usual. “If you’re here to say what I think you Are, then hurry up and get it over With.”

“That depends on what you think it is, but… you’re right about a lot of things, so you’re probably right about this, too. Anyway, I know you said you wouldn’t be able to come to me if your situation gets worse, so that’s why I’m coming to you. Because… even if you’re trying to handle whatever this issue is yourself, I don’t know if it’s working. And you aren’t fooling me, no matter how hard you try. Or Sora, for that matter.”

“Hmph. It’s awfully bold of you to become observant Now.”

“I mean, I still don’t think I’m particularly good at noticing these things, but I’m asking you because I won’t be able to pick up on anything else naturally. Besides, it’s a magician’s job to poke his nose into everything, isn’t it? To keep searching for truth, and transmute it into happiness? And I want to help you, not just because you taught me that ideal, but because – you’re my friend. You’re important to me.”

Natsume’s giving him a strange, sideways look, but pulls himself together with a shake of the head. “It’s Fine. That Is, it’s nothing that needs to concern You. And Besides, I told you not to ask about It.”

“I can’t go on not asking any longer, though. Not when you always seem so unhappy.”

“Fine! Fine, Then. If you really want to know what’s been bothering Me… I don’t think you should go to that Party.” His lips twist in dissatisfaction. “Tenshouin’s Party.”

That’s… almost an anticlimax, after weeks of tiptoeing around each other. The idea that something so minor had been causing all this trouble – and, for that matter, something minor they had talked through when it initially came up? It seems absurd. “But I thought we agreed I should attend for the sake of Switch. And I should go for the sake of my job, too.”

“I changed my Mind.”

“Look I realise you don’t like Eichi very much,” and Natsume snorts, “but I’ve been trying to give him a chance.”

“Haven’t you wasted enough chances on him Already?”

“I don’t think it’s a waste.”

“You Wouldn’t.”

“Well, my point is, if you think I shouldn’t go, I’d like to hear a reason that isn’t based on you disliking Eichi.”

“Hmm. To be Honest, I’m not sure I can provide One. Just call it a fortune teller’s bad Feeling.”

Natsume does have a tendency to speak in an indecipherable mix of truth and lies, but this doesn’t seem like any kind of falsehood. It’s almost cruel how straightforward he is about his feelings on Eichi, when getting an honest answer from him on anything else, especially anything related to Tsumugi, feels like trying to peer through a thick fog.

“Why? I mean, about what? I trust your intuition on things like this, but… my gut feeling is telling me that I  _ have _ to go.”

“Of course it would Be.” Natsume drags his hands down his face. “That Stupid, Stupid, Reading! I should never have let you talk me into It.”

Tsumugi might have all the pieces to this puzzle, now, and even he can tell there’s only one possible way for them to line up. But the more he turns that solution over in his mind, the less it seems to fit in with everything else he knows. “Natsume, I know this is a wild guess, but… could it be that you don’t want the reading to come true?”

“No, that isn’t It. Forget my Request, Then. It isn’t Anything,” he says, but his voice suggests it very much is. “The bottom line Is, I have this under Control. Which means you can stop poking your nose into places where it doesn’t Belong. Thank You. Goodbye.”

“You’re being confusing again. Either it’s actually something, or it’s your issues with Eichi, or it’s nothing. But it can’t be all three.”

“It completely  _ is _ all Three.”

“That doesn’t make any more sense. Or, well, it might, but you’d need to explain it properly.”

“Look, just leave me Alone. If you keep Prying, it’s only going to make things worse for both of Us.”

“I can’t. I told myself I’d never leave you on your own again, and I meant it. But you’re clearly hurting, and I just want to help you, especially if it’s my fault. I’m sorry for prying, and you deserve to hate me as much as you’d like for overstepping. I’m sure it’ll hurt if you decide to hate me again, but I don’t mind, as long as it makes you happy. Because I’m not sure I can agree to your request about the party, but please –”

“Get out!”

Natsume whirls on him, fury incarnate, voice on the edge of breaking. The force of his presence fills the room, and Tsumugi – in the tiny corner of his brain not paralysed by the depth of how badly he’s screwed up this time – thinks he can hear the crackle of electricity.

“You’re always like this! You always say one thing, and talk in circles about my happiness, but then act in another. But you can’t go on telling me that you care about my feelings, and then trampling on them. Spare me your hollow pity, Tsumugi. I don’t want it any more.”

The air is heavy, the way it is before a thunderstorm. But there’s no scent of rain, no promise of relief. Only the thick taste of ozone, and Natsume, glaring with the rage of some avenging angel, defiant.

“I’m sorry,” Tsumugi says helplessly, and sees himself out on autopilot.

The door closes heavily behind him, and he hears it lock with the finality of a hammer. In the corridor, he takes a moment to collect himself, and then another. The world filters back in around him, slowly, but it’s hard to hear much above the blood pounding in his ears. Even the noise of Sora and his game, a scant few metres down the hall, seems impossibly far away from him. Like he’s underwater, or in a vacuum, no sound reaching his ears, and he hadn’t even realised he was drowning.

He’d just really like to know what it is he’s getting wrong.

*

And then Natsume’s gone.

At least Tsumugi had known he was scheduled to vanish. A client halfway across the country had booked an appointment with him months ago, on his mother’s recommendation. The days he’s planned to be away have long since been cross-hatched out on their calendar, red pen layered over itself, and Tsumugi’s commitments drowned out in comparison. But all the red ink in the world can’t drown out the thick strokes that spell out EICHI PARTY.

(In the end, he  _ had  _ caved and texted Eichi. Just once, a day or two ago; just a confirmation of the party’s time and date, and whether it was still okay for him to get a ride there. Eichi had replied in the affirmative, expressed his eagerness, and punctuated it with a kaomoji.)

(He never used to send those.)

The house is even quieter with Natsume gone than with him playing the game of avoidance, somehow. Even at his scarcest, he had always left little traces of himself behind; windows left open, food eaten, gentle footfalls in the deep of the night. But now, there are no signs of life here at all. Only Tsumugi, and the terrible quiet, settling into the house’s bones. 

*

**ii. binary star **

At first glance, the Tenshouin mansion seems like something completely out of this world. A long driveway winds up almost to the mouth of the house, cutting across perfectly tended lawns; the house itself is a huge, pale thing, two storeys high, with wings extending forward on either side. By night, lit from underneath in bright yellow, it looks even less real. And Tsumugi, peering out the window of a snow-white Tenshouin limousine as it creeps along the approach, finds himself transfixed, unable to tear his eyes away. It looks more like an English country estate than anything he’d expect to find in Japan, as if at any second the doors might burst open, and spill out a chattering host of eighteenth-century lords and ladies. And Eichi, apparently, lives here all the time.

The car pulls to a stop by the front stairs, and the door silently pops open. Tsumugi pushes his way out into the summer night with little resistance. Even from out here, his ears can catch strains of piano music, accompanied by the low murmur of conversation. He technically hasn’t even arrived yet, and he already feels out of place.

Almost unconsciously, he makes his way to the front door, feet crunching against gravel. Hovering just outside, he finds himself hesitating again. There’s still time to turn and run; nobody’s noticed him out here, and there are thousands of excuses he could make to Eichi for his absence. He’s too off-balance to really want to be here, too bogged down by his routine of working late and returning to an empty house. And he’s too hot in his suit, too shabby against this aristocratic backdrop, too horribly alone in this den of better-bred wolves. But he’s done far more difficult things than this, probably. And if the trail of whatever fate Natsume had foreseen leads here, then he definitely can’t back down – if he even really has the choice to begin with.

Well. Time for his comedy of manners to begin.

The foyer also looks like something from another world entirely, cold with tile and harsh lighting, but he doesn’t have the chance to linger for long. Silently and immediately, a servant appears, and leads him down a brightly lit corridor towards the party. He doesn’t have time to look around, which is a shame. It seems like a place that might be fun to explore, given half a chance, even if it seems like a house that isn’t at all lived in. They pass portraits of long-dead Tenshouins, sombre paintings of landscapes, one or two busts set into small alcoves, all stark against perfectly white walls. And then there’s a pair of glass doors, and he’s ushered inside.

The party location is… more or less what he’d been expecting, actually, but only because he’d been expecting something out of a British period piece. It’s a colossal ballroom, with high ceilings and a dance floor and a staircase leading up to an overlooking mezzanine. There’s even a pianist in one corner, but whatever he’s playing is being swallowed up by the buzz of dozens of conversations. And wherever Tsumugi turns, he sees rich, beautiful people, many of whom look vaguely familiar. Some are dancing, more are talking, and a few are taking drinks or canapes from patrolling servants. But he’s hunting for one in particular among the crowd, for a single blond head, for what might be the destination of his fate – 

And Eichi turns, from where he’s holding a conversation across the room, and their gazes meet. The thrill of eye contact zaps through him, and Tsumugi’s breath dies in his throat. Even after the party’s host excuses himself and hurries over, ignoring the way heads turn in his wake, the world doesn’t stop tilting off its axis.

“Tsumugi!” Eichi sweeps towards him all at once, the hurricane force of his presence the same as it ever was. He’s wearing mostly white, of course, accented by notes of sky and navy blues. Those have always been his colours, even if they haven’t been Tsumugi’s for a long time. “You made it. No – I’m pleased that you could.”

In the summer heat, the first two or three buttons of Eichi’s crisp white shirt are completely open. Tsumugi tears his eyes upward. “Ah… of course I did. It’s a bit out of my usual league, but I like to try and keep promises to my friends.”

“Your attendance tonight was nothing so binding as a promise.” His lips suggest the leading edge of a smile. “Anyway. How have you been?”

“The same as ever, really. Switch still can’t debut properly, so not much can happen until Sora graduates and joins us. Well, living with Natsume is still eventful, but I’m not sure it’s the kind of eventful that’s worth relating.”

Eichi’s face smooths into a not-quite frown, in the curious way it only ever does when Natsume is mentioned. He’s much less transparent about his feelings on Natsume than vice versa, so it’s still a little hard to gauge exactly where he stands, but the two of them will definitely never be friends. “I’m certain he keeps you on your toes.”

Tsumugi opens his mouth, finds himself immediately snapping it shut. Because the usual Natsume does, but the sullen, withdrawn stranger who’s taken up residence in his home… not so much. But it feels like a betrayal to admit that to someone Natsume still very much seems to consider an enemy. So he folds his hands into themselves, casts around for an answer. “More or less.”

“You know, I’ve always thought that –” Eichi’s eyes narrow as he shifts focus to something across the room. Tsumugi follows his gaze to a pale, white-haired man who inclines his head in their direction. “Sorry, I’m being summoned. I’d like to talk to you at length later, though.”

“Ah… all right. See you, then.”

After he leaves, Tsumugi takes a moment to catch his breath; even now, looking at Eichi leaves him a little snowblind. And he’s so much more than usual tonight, so perfectly in his element, that he barely seems real.

Still: despite where his fate may or may not lead him, despite the fact he feels unusually restless and too large for his skin, despite his desire to glue himself to his phone until the radio silence is finally broken, he’s supposed to be making himself useful here. In practice, though, he finds himself at a loose end. Ostensibly, he’s here as much on behalf of Switch as for himself; the Tenshouin family’s connections in the entertainment world mean that this room is full of movers and shakers, people he absolutely needs to network with. It had been just about the only reason that Natsume had, begrudgingly, agreed that he should attend in the first place. And look where committing to attend had gotten him – 

But he’s narrowly saved from going down that particular spiral, from thinking himself into a corner until the melancholy takes him, by the sound of a loud, familiar voice.

“Tsumugi! It’s been such a long, long time since we last saw each other.”

He glances up, and can’t decide whether or not he’s surprised. To be honest, though, he probably should’ve expected to run into Tomoe Hiyori here. Tsumugi doesn’t know what kind of terms he’s on with Eichi these days, but their families have always moved in similar circles, and rich-people protocol probably demands that they invite each other to everything regardless. And he, too, looks the way he always has, only sharpened. Hiyori’s shirt tonight is a deep, vibrant green, almost in defiance of his host’s preference for tasteful blues – but, knowing him, it’s just as likely to have been an impulse decision.

“Oh. Good evening, Hiyori.”

“Such a flat greeting for such an old friend? For an old friend who came to say hello to you, out of the goodness of his heart, despite being highly in-demand?”

“It’s good to see you again,” he says, and it’s true. “We haven’t seen much of each other since we graduated – well, since you left Yumenosaki, really.”

“You could stand to sound less dreary about it.”

“I don’t mean it drearily.”

“I know, I know, I’m just bothering you. Still, if you were to reach out to me, I could probably manage to find a time to meet up.”

Even though their time in the same unit is ancient history by now, Tsumugi still understands him well enough to follow the implication. “I’ll make sure to message you tomorrow, then. Assuming your details haven’t changed, I mean.”

“They haven’t, so you had better.” Hiyori offers him a smug, satisfied little smile. “Anyway, anyway! Enough of that – how are you?”

“Um… I’m fine.”

For an instant, Tsumugi lets himself entertain the idea that destiny had led him to Hiyori tonight. But he dismisses the thought almost as soon as it occurs to him, deeming it too wild a swing. It’s true that Natsume’s prediction had pointed to a person of wealth that he shared some kind of history with, but Hiyori? Hiyori, who he’s never once considered in any kind of romantic light; who’s still never really spoken to him about their shared sins; who, to the best of his knowledge, has never had eyes for anyone but Nagisa?

“Stop thinking so hard, Tsumugi, it wasn’t that difficult a question. You’re frowning, and an idol can hardly afford to give himself wrinkles at such a young age. Not even you could make that work as a charm point.”

Tsumugi snaps abruptly back to himself, to find his companion staring rather pointedly at him. “Oh.  _ Was  _ I frowning?”

“You need to start being more aware of things like that,” Hiyori says, displaying absolutely no self-awareness himself, and waves over one of the servants patrolling the hall. “Anyway, I’m drinking. Are you going to join me?”

“Uh… no, thank you.”

“Oh, are you worried about the legality of it? Don’t worry too hard about it, the rich have a whole different set of laws. And you’re practically twenty anyway, you know.”

“Maybe another time,” he says, even though he isn’t at all sure he’d care for it. But he certainly doesn’t want his first real experience with alcohol to be tonight, of all nights, when he’s supposed to be meeting his destiny.

Hiyori takes a glass of white wine from the servant, and tosses half of it back in one swig. “Well, to each their own. But personally, I find it the only thing that makes these awful get-togethers halfway tolerable. Say what you will about the Tenshouins, and I certainly do, but they know how to choose their wines.”

“Really?”

“Oh, yes. Eichi’s father has quite the reputation as a sommelier, and word has it that his son’s been taking lessons. It’s been paying off, by all accounts, and I can vouch for that myself. When I was at his family’s last Christmas party, he suggested we try the most divine cabernet sauvignon – and I don’t even enjoy red wine, so you know that opinion can be trusted. But don’t tell him I said that, because Eichi’s ego would never recover from learning I complimented him.” Hiyori pulls himself out of the story and turns to Tsumugi, who can only imagine what kind of face he must be making. His expression goes a little rigid at the edges in response. “You didn’t know that.”

“I mean… there’s no reason I should have.”

It’s true. So what if Eichi leads the kind of life he could never even imagine, moving in circles of people who’d never look twice at a commoner? So what if he had been born with a cutlery drawer’s worth of silver spoons in his mouth, while the Aoba household is still, as often as not, skirting bankruptcy? And so what if he’s taking lessons in wine-tasting, when Tsumugi doesn’t even think he knows what a cabernet sauvignon  _ is_? The gap between them had always been obvious, from the moment they’d met. It just… wasn’t supposed to have widened, lately.

“Tsumugi, Tsumugi, Tsumugi.” Hiyori frowns, and it’s an alien expression on him. “I thought you had stopped doing whatever it was you were doing. I mean, playing that game where you threw yourself at him.”

“I have.” Well, consciously; it’s one thing to throw himself at Eichi, and quite another to see if fate might bring them together again, and he isn’t not curious about the latter. “It isn’t like that at all.”

“Isn’t it.”

He weighs up his options, decides they’re unlikely to be overheard, and he can probably trust Hiyori with this. Because regardless of their history, and Eichi’s newfound talent for selecting wines, there’s still no love lost between them that Tsumugi knows of. Besides, Hiyori isn’t likely to tell anyone but Nagisa, the least gossipy person in existence – and someone who might also, in his own way, understand.

“Well, the truth is.” He squares his shoulders, tries not to regret turning down the offer of a drink. “A couple of weeks ago, I asked Natsume to perform a love reading for me. Not for any important reason, or on the back of any important hunch, but because my mother got the idea in her head that I should settle down. Of course, I’m not at a point in my life where I can afford to do that, but… I was curious, I think. Not just about being able to give her some kind of answer, but also about whether someone might come to love me. Anyway, the point is, I think that reading suggested something might happen at the party tonight. So I’m not throwing myself at Eichi, exactly. I’m just –”

“Hoping that fate does the throwing for you, mm?”

“Not really hoping. Just waiting to see if that’s the case, and thinking that it might be.”

Hiyori’s lips are pursed in thought. “How  _ is _ Natsume doing these days, anyway?”

“I thought we were talking about Eichi.”

“Oh, we are. But we’ll come back to him, Tsumugi. Right now, we’re discussing Natsume and his prophecy.”

“Well… we’ve lived together ever since he graduated,” Tsumugi says, because answering the question properly would mean admitting that his relationship with Natsume is a mess he isn’t sure how to fix. “Although he’s out of town at the moment for his fortune telling work. His plane’s supposed to come in later tonight, but I’m not sure if I’ll manage to catch him once I’m home. And how’s Nagisa?”

“He’s well, of course. Our work with Eden is going splendidly, and he seems… happy, lately. And I’m sure he’d appreciate it if you found it in yourself to message him, too.” Hiyori jabs an accusatory finger in his direction, coming dangerously close to actually poking him in the ribs. “But while I respect your spirit, I won’t let you go on avoiding the question.”

“I haven’t been, though?”

“You’re not even good at lying, Tsumugi. And while your transparency is usually endearing, naive as it is, this time I won’t stand for it. So, just to ensure we’re on the same page: you live with Natsume. You see him every day of your life, because you chose to.”

“Yes?”

“But you’re here tonight, in part – if not entirely – because you think destiny’s nudging you towards  _ Eichi_.”

“Yes…?” Tsumugi tries. “I mean, I’m also here to network for my job, but that wasn’t not a factor. The reading was fairly specific, and he fit all the criteria. As I said, though, it isn’t like I’m actively holding out for it to be him, or anything. But I’m not sure I see what one thing has to do with the other. Natsume and I might live together, but it’s because we’re friends. That isn’t going to change, and I don’t think either of us really wants it to.”

“Ugh! Never mind.” Hiyori lifts his wine glass to his lips, realises it’s empty, sets it down on the table beside him with an irritated flourish. “But in my opinion, you’re far too good for Eichi, anyway. And we can leave this conversation there, because I’m tired of going around in circles.”

“Um… thank you, I think.”

“That was clearly a compliment. But forget about fate and destiny and romance for now, all right?”

“I can’t promise that I’ll be able to get it off my mind, but… I can try.”

“Good, because if you’re here for work, then the least I can do is introduce you to some important people. And you’ll need to make a decent impression. Put on your best smile, and come right along.”

With Hiyori to ease his path, Tsumugi winds up chatting to four other up-and-coming idols, an alumnus of the Yumenosaki theatre track, a director interested in moving from cinema to music videos, the guitarist of a band whose name sounds vaguely familiar, the hostess of a late-night talk show, both of Hidaka Hokuto’s parents, and even, in the strangest conversation of the night, Eichi’s mother. Forgetting about his problems is surprisingly easy, like this; he likes his job, even the socially intense parts, and focusing on the task at hand clears his mind like nothing else. Midnight comes and goes, and the pockets of his blazer grow fat with business cards. And he’s so caught up in his current conversation – with a former student of Shuuetsu, about the merits of Yumenosaki’s dreamfes system – that he barely notices Eichi’s reappearance until he’s being tapped on the elbow.

“Might I borrow you for a moment, Tsumugi?”

“Ah – of course. For what?”

“That,” says Eichi, “is a secret. Don’t worry, though, I promise it’s nothing nefarious.”

(That’s probably the truth, but the leading edge of Eichi’s smile makes him wish it wasn’t.) 

“All right.”

So he follows Eichi out of the ballroom, and then out of the east wing, and then out of the house. It’s high summer, but the air is still a little cooler out here, in the open and away from the press of people. Eichi looks like something spectral as he leads Tsumugi into the gardens, hair nearly as white as his blazer in the lamplight. He’s grown it out a little since graduation, and it catches the night breeze. It isn’t quite as long as Tsumugi’s was, towards the end of their third year, or as disorderly, but it suits him.

They find a bench a little further along the cobbled path, and Eichi sits first, sprawled against the back. The angle of his body is like something sublime, but the light in his eyes is all human. Tsumugi hovers awkwardly in front of him, like the worshipper he still is.

“It was so stuffy in there,” he complains. “I feel like I can breathe for the first time all night. And it’s good to be in the company of the only person I know is here for me, not my family.”

“I’m sure that isn’t true.”

“It’s kind of you to say that, but you don’t need to flatter me. Everyone else is here for me as an idol or a Tenshouin, not as Eichi.” A corner of his mouth quirks at some unspoken punchline. “Do sit down, Tsumugi. You look like you might bolt.”

Tsumugi sits. The wood of the bench is cold, even through his clothing. Far off, the light from the ballroom spills out onto the lawn, unbroken but for the play of silhouettes behind the windows.

“I’m glad the weather cleared up,” Eichi continues. “Especially because the rainy season seems to have run long, this year. I was worried when I saw it was cloudy this morning, because it meant we might have had to adjust our plans, but it appears to have worked out. Even though the party is indoors, the atmosphere would have been much worse in the middle of a thunderstorm.”

“That’s probably true. I imagine this house might feel like something out of a horror movie, when it rains.” He catches himself too late, as always. “That was rude. I’m sorry for insulting your home, after you took the trouble to generously invite me here.”

“You don’t need to apologise. Actually, I’m pleased you still feel like you can speak straightforwardly to me. And, to be honest, I wouldn’t argue the point anyway. I hardly spent any of my childhood in this house, and parts of it still feel unfamiliar.”

“Oh,” says Tsumugi, and then, “I’m sorry. Again.”

“You make it sound like my illness is your fault.”

“No, it wasn’t that kind of sorry, because I know I had nothing to do with it. It was a ‘sorry that happened to you’. Because I am.”

It feels like completely the wrong thing to have said, almost as soon as he’s said it. Luckily, though, Eichi still has a tendency to approach conversations with the subtlety of a steamroller, and by some small miracle, he keeps plowing ahead.

“Regardless, it really has been a while. I haven’t seen you in… what, three months?”

“Longer, I think.”

“Of course.” Eichi gives the tiniest shake of his head. “Time passes so strangely, now. Weeks go by in a blink, but nights like this seem interminably long.”

“It isn’t that bad, is it?”

“As I said, I could tolerate it if I felt like anyone was here for me – well, anyone  _ else_. But as it is, they’re all fans or sycophants.”

“That can’t be completely true. At the very least, I spoke to Hiyori in there.”

“Fans, sycophants, and Hiyori, then. Who I’m sure would complain terribly if he was lumped in with either category.”

There’s something about the way he says that – something about the angle of his mouth, the openness of his posture, the unnameable expression in his eyes – that makes Tsumugi forget himself again. The way he always has, around Eichi, and maybe always will. He speaks almost before he can think better of it.

“Eichi,” he says, “are you happy?”

Eichi turns to face him straight-on. He doesn’t say anything, for a little while, as still as a marble statue under the lamplight. Unblinking, unyielding. The only sign of life is the way the breeze catches the ends of his hair, and the way the lines of his face crease as he thinks.

“I was so certain, after the war, that I’d have nothing left for me but a kingdom of ashes and a slow death. I was cursed to, you know, and I would have deserved it. So to have been able to graduate, and to have found the whole world waiting for me once I did… And I have  _ friends_, Tsumugi, ordinary friendships like an ordinary man. Wataru, and Tori and Yuzuru, and sometimes I get messages from my old classmates and my juniors, too. Why, these days, Keito and I can even hold a conversation without arguing – well, without arguing much. And on top of everything else, I’ve finally managed to become an idol. So yes, I think I am.”

Eichi’s always been prone to making speeches, and to strange bouts of honesty, but this one seems to slice right through him. Tsumugi folds his hands, chooses to address the part he know he can answer. “I thought you were always an idol.”

“Well, in name. But it’s one thing to claim to be an idol, and quite another to actually live as one, and I know I’ve grown into the latter.” Eichi smiles, and it doesn’t feel self-deprecating for once. “Because an idol is a conduit for love. If I’m a splendid idol, these days, it’s only because I’ve finally come to understand that.”

“I see,” Tsumugi says, even though he’s not sure he does. 

“And? Are you?”

“An idol?” The question gives him more pause than it should. “I don’t know if I am by that standard, and I’m still not sure I deserve to call myself one anyway. And I still have a long way to go regardless, but… I’m trying. Because I’d still rather be an idol, or someone who tends to idols, than anything else.”

“No, that isn’t what I meant. Let me ask directly, then – are  _ you  _ happy, Tsumugi?”

This one, though, is easy. “I think so. But I don’t know if I would know, if that makes sense.”

“It does. Happiness is always most obvious in hindsight, I think, or when you don’t look directly at it.” Eichi crosses his legs at the ankles, hums thoughtfully. “But you enjoy your work with Switch? You don’t regret taking that path?”

“I don’t regret it – I mean, I couldn’t. My work with Switch, and my work with my agency, were both the right choices for me to make. And it’s true not much is happening with either of them, yet, but seeds always take time to sprout.”

“I know you’ll tend to them well.”

“I can only try.”

“I…” Eichi seems to hesitate, and then exhales. “No. It’s nothing.”

Tsumugi has a hard time believing that any thought Tenshouin Eichi has ever had could be classed as  _ nothing_. Especially something worded so ominously, and at such an ominous time. But there’s no easy way to press the issue, not without further straining the atmosphere, and he’s feeling off-base enough that he doesn’t know how to change the subject.

The breeze suddenly feels like it’s slicing through him, and yet his suit feels impossibly stifling. Is this really where his destiny is supposed to have led him? To the acknowledgment that he and Eichi are happy where they are, at this distance, and neither of them has really acted to change that? Even if they were able to, at this point?

And it occurs to him, then, that Eichi didn’t name him as one of his friends.

*

It’s one thing to have forged a truce with Natsume, amongst the ashes of fine’s crimes, on a night where they hadn’t been former enemies, but a matched pair of people who’d lost everything. But by the light of day, Tsumugi isn’t sure he expects it to come to anything. Neither of them had quite been themselves, after all, stripped down to loss and loneliness and little else. So he isn’t expecting any follow-through, and as the semester crawls past, he resolves himself to never getting it.

One afternoon, a couple of weeks out from winter break, he’s sorting books in the library, hidden amongst the shelves. The end of semester is always busy for the library staff; they have to chase down any outstanding loans, do a final round of cleaning, and make sure that everything is in order. It’s a lot of work, even for a full committee, and Tsumugi is functionally this year’s committee in its entirety. Well, technically there’s a second active member, but Keito seems more exhausted with every passing week, so it wouldn’t be right to ask for his time.

The problem is, he could really use the help. No matter how diligently he catalogues these books, shuffles them around on the shelves to return each to its place, they never seem to stay in order. He’ll organise a stack by reference number, but they muddle themselves up as soon as he takes his eyes off them. And there are dozens of missing titles, some of which are overdue loans, but just as many – no, more – are seemingly gone without explanation. It’s enough to make a headache start brewing against his temples, and he rubs exhaustedly at his eyes.

Through the building haze, he hears the door swing open and footsteps tap along the carpet, and he glances up desperately. He’s tired enough that he’s probably just imagining things, but he can’t help but hope regardless. Maybe it’s Keito, come to help of his own volition, so Tsumugi doesn’t have to feel bad about asking, or maybe it’s Nagisa, who’s always been kind in his own strange way, or maybe, despite everything, it’s Eichi – 

But it turns out to be Natsume, looking much thinner than the last time he and Tsumugi crossed paths. Or maybe he just seems smaller in a Yumenosaki blazer, rather than his lab coat, less like a magician and more like a high schooler shrunken in on himself, hovering uncertainly by the entrance to the literature aisle. But his eyes are still sharp, almost wild in their intensity.

“Oh,” he says, “you’re Here.”

Tsumugi opens his mouth, closes it again. He hasn’t seen his underclassman, childhood friend, whatever they’re supposed to be to each other, in weeks, and it really does make him happy to be sought out. If that’s indeed what this is. “Good afternoon, Natsume. I’m glad to see you. And I’m always here, but what brings you to the library?”

“I’ve Decided, out of the goodness of my Heart, to help with the committee’s work Today.”

“Why?”

“I just told You, didn’t I? Because I felt like being Generous. Besides, you’re so slow and clumsy that you’re likely to graduate before you Finish.”

That doesn’t sound like an entirely honest answer, but it’s probably too much to ever expect one from Natsume. And he has a thousand good reasons not to look this particular gift horse in the mouth, especially if it means he’s going to be able to go home earlier than planned.

“All right. Thank you, then. If you come over here, I can explain to you what I’m doing.”

So Natsume drifts over, and Tsumugi walks him through the process. It’s fairly simple; he selects a shelf, writes down the call numbers of the books at either end, and works his way along to make sure everything between them is ordered correctly. If a book is completely out of place, he files it away on the trolley for re-sorting. Then he checks the trolley to see if any books he’s rescued earlier belong in this section, and returns them to their homes if they do. And after all that, he checks the contents of the shelf against the catalogue, and writes down the names of any titles that still aren’t there.

“This doesn’t seem all that Hard,” Natsume points out, leaning against a shelf full of German classics. “Why has it taken you so Long?”

“Well, some of these books have reference numbers with a lot of digits after the decimal place, so it’s easy to muddle them up. Especially after I’ve been trying to focus on the same thing for a while. Also, there are a lot of shelves… I’ve been on the library committee for nearly two years, and I keep forgetting how many books we actually have.”

“Typical. You really are useless on your Own.”

“There’s an entire committee, you know. But they’re all busy with more important things.”

“More important than fulfilling their Duties?”

“Maybe not, but I can’t really blame them. Either they’re busy with homework, or they have club activities, or they just don’t want to spend time with a former member of fine. We may have been playing the role of the shining heroes, but we still made a lot of enemies along the way. It’s only fair.”

“Most things aren’t  _ about _ Fairness, Senpai.” There’s a bite to Natsume’s voice, one he’s not sure he’s ever heard before. “Isn’t that the lesson we both learned from this whole Disaster?”

“Mm, it might have been a disaster, but… I still don’t think I’d want to take any of it back. I know it’s selfish of me to say so, but I think someday I’ll be able to look back on this year, and feel like we ended up gaining more than we lost.”

“But not Yet?”

“No,” Tsumugi says, “not quite yet.”

Natsume makes a noncommittal sound, as if he’s thinking over his words. He looks completely at home here, amongst these books nobody ever reads, just one more abandoned thing. “If that’s coming from You, someone with no sense of pain at All… you must really be Shaken.”

“I think it’s less about being shaken, and more that I’m still trying to process it. A lot happened in quite a short time, after all, and I’m not so incapable of feeling that I’m not sad about the losses of others.”

“There you go Again, talking about things like they aren’t your Problem. What about your own Losses?”

“Well, I’m sad about those too, of course. But at least I didn’t lose you.”

Pure disdain spreads across Natsume’s face, and he whips his head away. “You never had me in the first Place!” he snaps. “But you’re getting Distracted, and neither of us have so much time we can afford to waste It. Just point me at whichever shelf you want me to start Sorting.”

It stings a little to be rejected so coldly, but the fact is that Natsume’s still here. And that Tsumugi offered up his life, and Natsume saw fit to take it. Because so long as that connection persists, no matter how faintly, he’ll have managed to protect something precious.

“Well, I’m working on the 920s, so why don’t you start at the 950s? That should leave enough of a buffer that I won’t catch up to you, especially because the 930s are such a large section.”

“Mm, all Right.”

They work in silence for a few minutes, Natsume on French literature and Tsumugi on Chinese, falling into a rhythm. It’s – surprisingly comfortable, actually. They’ve overlapped in the secret room and the underground archives enough that they’re used to each other, but keeping that company hasn’t always been straightforward, and as with everything in Tsumugi’s life, it’s become exponentially more complicated since Eichi’s founding and dissolution of fine. He was certain that his choice had come at the cost of easy company like this, but it’s not bad to be proven wrong.

“Senpai,” Natsume says, a little while in, apropos of nothing, in the same tone of voice he might use to discuss the weather. “I’m going to Talk, and you’re going to Listen. But the conditions are that you don’t look at Me, and you don’t speak until I say you Can. Understand?”

Tsumugi hums under his breath, keeps his eyes on the section of the shelf he’s reordering, rescues a how-to book about origami that’s wildly out of place. The only hint that he isn’t alone is the blur of red in his periphery, in the gap where his glasses end and his regular vision begins.

“All Right. Well, to begin With, I’ve chosen to remain at this School. For a While, I wasn’t sure if I Would… but we made a Promise. Your life remains in my Hands, and I won’t allow you to wriggle out of it so Easily. Do something to show me you’re still paying Attention.”

He swaps two books around, smooths a finger along their spines. His entire body feels stiff, like it belongs to someone else, but he still manages to jerk his head.

“On top of That, for all its Flaws, Yumenosaki is still a place where many dreams should Bloom. And since the rulers of this school have proven Untrustworthy, it falls to you and I to serve as their Guardians. Between Us, as a former member of fine and a former Oddball, we’re qualified to be a perfectly neutral Party. Nod your head Again.”

He nods and checks his list. There’s a gap on the shelves where there shouldn’t be; he needs to find out if the title that’s supposed to be there is in the secret room, or if some other student has spirited it away, or if he’s simply made a mistake. But suddenly Natsume’s hand snakes past him, slots the missing book into place from nowhere. Their arms brush when he steps away, completely unintentionally, and the heat of another body sears Tsumugi like a naked flame.

“And I’ll be Honest. I still don’t trust You, but I can accept that I might need You, at least for a While. You were the first one at this school who’d spoken to me in a long Time, after All… and the first one I’ve spoken to Since. But it doesn’t mean anything.”

Tsumugi lifts an armful of books, brushes out dust from under them. His hair, just longer than he’d usually keep it, is itchy against the back of his neck. “Of course it doesn’t.”

“I didn’t say you could talk Yet. But I do have a question for You, so at least you screwed up with good Timing. Why did you choose Tenshouin?”

That makes Tsumugi glance up too sharply, too honestly, breaking the spell he’s supposed to be under. But Natsume’s still perfectly focused on his own work, seemingly more interested in some books he’s never read than a conversation which cuts to the heart of everything.

“Sorry?”

“I know you heard Me. And I thought I knew You, Too, but then you acted in a way I couldn’t have Predicted. Why did you side with him and join Fine?”

“Because he was my friend. And because I don’t think his ideals were wrong, even if he hurt a lot of people in seeing them through. And because he always looked so lonely.”

Natsume sets a book down with far more force than necessary. It’s too loud in the empty library, in the space between them. “But it can’t just be That. You had plenty of Friends, in every class and club and Committee – even the other Oddballs liked You. And in the End, Tenshouin wound up throwing you away as soon as he was Done. So what made you choose him over everyone Else?”

And Natsume isn’t wrong; there are deeper truths here, too, and he rolls them around on his tongue. Because he still believes that Eichi’s dream, for all the problems with its execution, had ultimately been noble? Because he’d been looking for any escape out of his quiet, predictable life? Because he’d probably have clung to anyone with the ambition he’s always lacked?

“Because he made me feel… something honest. Something real, in a way I didn’t know I could be, and don’t know if I can manage to again. It’s okay, though. I think I’m happy to have glimpsed something like that just once in my life.”

It takes Tsumugi a moment to realise that Natsume’s stopped working. When he glances up from under his fringe, there’s something furious in his gaze.

“You’re unbelievably Annoying, you know That? It’s bad enough you always talk like your time with fine happened to someone Else – but it’s worse that you keep talking about it like you’ve already Peaked. You’re  _ not even out of high School!_”

Natsume’s really angry, now, crowding him back against the bookshelf with eyes aflame. It makes Tsumugi’s pulse race a little, but – that’s just an adrenaline response. “I’m, uh. I’m sorry?”

“Clearly you Aren’t! You shouldn’t say things you don’t Mean, because it doesn’t suit You. The only good thing about you is that you’re Honest.”

“But I think I really am sorry?”

“Why is that a Question.”

“Because I know I probably am, but it’s hard to tell if I really feel as much, or if I just think it would be right of me to say so. I’ve sort of had to train myself into giving the right responses, a lot of the time… and even then, I still slip up.” Tsumugi smooths his hair out of his face. “I really do want to apologise for making you angry, though.”

“That’s completely the wrong Reason. You’re meant to be sorry for saying those things about Yourself, which is why I’m angry at you in the first Place.”

“But, I mean, it’s true. At least, the part about my feelings is. Whatever I felt for Eichi… was like a shooting star, or a comet passing close to Earth. It only happened because of a certain set of circumstances, and those might never come to pass again.”

Natsume is still very, very close to him. And for once he’s not threatening violence, but looking at him straight-on. There’s something unreadable in his gaze, something that doesn’t make any kind of sense at all, something softer and almost a little melancholy. It’s just a fancy, but when he exhales, Tsumugi thinks he can feel that same air against his lips.

“That doesn’t mean you can stop watching the Skies.”

His breath catches between them, arrested by the daring of that possibility. Tsumugi had been content to trudge along with his head down, meeting others without impacting them, until he’d found himself doing so in the worst possible way. He’s not someone worthy of a love story, even a tragic one. It feels incongruous with the quiet, pared-down life he’s always predicted for himself, one carved out among minutiae and a slow crawl to a meaningless destination. And it still feels wrong to hope for that kind of miracle to occur again; he signed away that chance when he agreed to become a villain, and miracles are only supposed to happen once, anyway. But even if he can do nothing else, even if he’s not sure he has the right to work towards his happiness – that much is true. That he has nothing really left to lose, and that he might yet have something to gain, by lifting his gaze to the stars.

“You’re right, of course. Thank you for reminding me to keep looking up.”

Tsumugi tries not to be disappointed when Natsume pulls back, recentres himself, hunches into his turtleneck. Unsurprisingly, it doesn’t really work. “Well, it’s none of my concern what happens to You. But if we’re going to work Together, the least you can do is stop being so hopeless and Miserable.”

“All right. I’d hate to drag you down.”

“It isn’t That. I wouldn’t have agreed to a life debt from someone who would be of no use at All, you Know.” He taps his side of the trolley, sitting forgotten between them, and reality breaks back in. “Hand me that green book closest to You? It belongs on the last shelf I looked At.”

And, as they fall back into their silent rhythm, it’s a little easier to breathe. A little easier to focus on the task at hand, and not mix up the numbers. A little easier to believe that things will, someday, get better; that Yumenosaki will flourish again, and its guardians along with it.

Natsume’s something of a miracle himself, after all.

*

Twelve forty-seven in the morning, and he’s alone with Eichi in the gardens of the Tenshouin family estate. The sky overhead is clear, but there’s too much light pollution for a good view of any constellations, from the lamps set along the garden path to the distant glow of the city. He could probably still make out Vega, if he tried, but that isn’t the star he’s been seeking.

They lapse into silence, and then the silence keeps lapsing. The summer breeze that had seen them out has made itself scarce, like the intruder it is, and the night is perfectly still. Still, and humid beyond belief; Tsumugi’s sweating beneath the collar of his shirt, under the bridge of his glasses, where his hair covers the back of his neck. For all his flaws, conversation usually comes naturally to him. But in the moment, caught between the weight of countless expectations, he can no more find the words than he can turn back time.

Talking to Eichi used to be easier than this, didn’t it?

He casts around, but he can never quite remember. Surely it must have been; surely, among everything, among the study sessions conducted in stark white hospital rooms, the performances on identical sky-blue stages, the hurried strategy meetings in library aisles, golden in the light of countless sunsets, Eichi must have shown enough of himself to have made Tsumugi fall for him. But they’d spent a year out of step, and far longer trying to learn how to walk together, and after this long, the Eichi of his memories – the one he recalls as something divine, but with all the warmth of a human body – may as well have been completely mute.

“Is something wrong, Tsumugi?”

Eichi’s looking at him with genuine concern, or something close to it. And Eichi’s still his friend, and Eichi’s still important to him, and Eichi’s still ethereally beautiful, but being with him doesn’t make Tsumugi’s heart skip. Not any more. And, thinking back, it hasn’t for a long time.

And the love reading still fidgets at the front of his mind, as immediate as ever, the hope and the fear of it, and the fragile expression on Natsume’s face as he’d teased out what it meant. Because this party is full of women like Eichi, with the same upbringing and circumstances – or, at least women who, seen from a particular angle on a particular day at a particular time, might reflect a fraction of Eichi’s brilliance. But Tsumugi doesn’t want that either. It’s a sobering thought, but if the two of them had met for the first time  _ now_, at twenty and not sixteen… well, he would still probably have been interested, but it would never have come to mean anything.

And, suddenly, he knows he has to go home. Despite how strange and loaded things have been there lately; despite the fact he doesn’t know how to fix things, only that he wants to. Home, and to Natsume.

“I’m fine,” he says, and means it. “I’m just a little tired.”

“Shall I have someone drive you home?”

“Ah – yes, I’d appreciate it. Thank you for inviting me tonight, but… I think I’ve had enough.”

“I’ll walk you back in, then.”

They stand, and Eichi leads him out of the gardens. Back up the pathway, back towards the house with light spilling from its windows, and away from their last chance to arrive at the same destiny. Tsumugi falls into step with him easily; they’ve always been nearly of a height, after all. But the sounds of their shoes, crunching on the gravel, land just out of time with each other.

“Well,” says Eichi, as he comes to a stop outside the ballroom, backlit in white and gold, “thank you for making an escape with me.”

“Please, wait,” Tsumugi says, with an urgency he hadn’t known he possessed. “Before we go back, there’s one more thing I want to ask about.”

Because it’s true, and there’s something glaring here that he hasn’t let himself point out yet. And this time, he won’t make the same mistake; won’t let himself think he doesn’t have the right to make the first move, and reach out to the people that matter, even if it means he might get burned.

Eichi’s expression, a soft crinkling around his eyes and mouth, suggests he already knows what it is. “Go ahead, then.”

“Earlier, when I asked if you were happy… you didn’t name me as one of your friends.”

“Ah, I thought as much.” He puffs out a laugh. “Because I’m still not, yet, but – I would still like to be. I know it’s far too late to hope we can someday go to karaoke together, but I do, sincerely, want to get along with you properly. And even though we aren’t in the same unit any more, I’d like you to watch me bloom, too.”

And it’s that growth, more than anything, that convinces him he’s making the right choice in leaving. Because this Eichi is so much better and brighter, and Tsumugi wants to be able to match that. To watch his performances as an idol, and support him as a friend, and get things right this time. They may not be on the same path any more, or heading to the same destination, but for now, they can still walk alongside each other.

“I know,” says Tsumugi. “You never weren’t.”

Eichi gives him that strange not-quite-smile again, but he’s undoubtedly happy. “You always were far too kind to me. And for what it’s worth, if it’s worth anything – I’m glad you’re doing well, too. What good is a bluebird if it can’t seek out its own happiness?”

“It’s worth a lot, actually. Thank you.”

“As I said: far too kind.” The curve of his lips doesn’t falter. “If you’ll excuse me, I’ll go speak to one of our drivers, and see about getting you home. I’d suggest you finish up the rest of your business, while you can.”

So he proceeds to do just that, in the suddenly stifling air of the ballroom. His goodbyes are surprisingly quick, considering the number of people he’s spoken to tonight, with only two exceptions. Hiyori casts him a meaningful look, almost comical in its intensity, tells him to send Natsume his regards, and insists on being able to hear all the details next time they meet. And then Eichi clasps his hand in farewell, and promises to message him. And then he’s out, into the night.

The ride home is uneventful, and Tsumugi spends most of it zoning out. It takes much less time to get back from Eichi’s than it did to get there, the roads quiet at this time of night, and it feels like he’s barely settled in before the drive is over. So he sends Eichi a quick message to let him know he’s returned safely, and watches the Tenshouin car until it vanishes into the night.

He checks his watch, glances up at the dark window of his home. Natsume should be back from his business trip by now, but that doesn’t necessarily mean he’s around, or even awake. The last time he had flown somewhere for work, he had been so exhausted by the return flight that he’d knocked out for almost twelve hours as soon as he’d gotten home. He’d claimed it was because he hated planes, but Tsumugi had quietly suspected that it was because he’d immediately obliterated his sleep schedule, in the absence of a less nocturnal housemate.

But, for once, he isn’t sure he actually wants to see Natsume. Not when he’s been so volatile lately; not when things between them stand the way they do. And certainly not when Tsumugi’s love reading has dead-ended so sharply on the night of his biggest chance, and he doesn’t trust himself not to break the news. Still, it’s that or stand outside all night, which doesn’t exactly give him a choice.

Even though the house looked dark from outside, the kitchen light is on when Tsumugi lets himself in, and he can hear the humming of a fan from the entryway. He breathes in, shucks off his shoes, and pads inside. Natsume’s at the dining table, in his pajamas, and barely looks up at his arrival. He seems the same as ever, looking uncharacteristically casual for someone who’s just caught a plane halfway across the country. The look in his eyes is wary, but not cruel.

“There you Are. It’s not like you to be home so Late.”

Tsumugi, still in his suit, feels weirdly underdressed for this conversation. Especially because he still doesn’t know where they stand in relation to each other, and this situation isn’t exactly offering many clues. “Were you waiting up for me? You didn’t have to, you know, especially after your flight.”

“Please. I hardly trust you alone with Tenshouin, especially at a Party.”

Even before this particular issue arose, they’ve had no shortage of arguments about Tsumugi’s relationship with Eichi, sometimes at great length. Because none of them are the same as they were in high school, and it seems unreasonable to hold Eichi accountable for his teenage mistakes, especially when he’s worked hard to grow past them – but at the same time, Tsumugi can’t pretend to understand Natsume’s wounds. So neither of them have ever made any ground, and it remains a festering issue. Tonight, though, he finds himself reluctant to get caught up in the same old debate.

“Well, it doesn’t really matter now. Welcome home, Natsume.”

Natsume glances away. “That’s supposed to be my Line. But, for what it’s Worth, I’m glad to be Back.”

“So.” Tsumugi hangs his jacket over the back of a chair, sits across from his housemate, pushes up his glasses and rubs at his eyes. The table isn’t particularly large, so their legs knock together as he scoots his chair forward. Natsume’s shin is a hard line against his calf. “How did your trip go?”

“I should be asking you That.”

“Well, it wasn’t really anything.”

“Don’t give me such a useless Answer. Tenshouin didn’t try anything with You, did He?”

“No? I only really spoke to him once, anyway, because he was so busy. And we cleared the air, but nothing really came of it.”

Natsume’s lips jump a little, in something that looks like satisfaction. It’s an unexpected shadow of his old self, after these weeks of rain. “Good. He had better not Have.”

“Like I said, we didn’t even talk much. I spent most of my time trying to make new contacts, or with Hiyori, or both. He asked after you, by the way.”

“Hmph. I don’t Want, or Need, the greetings of a former member of Fine.”

There’s no real purpose in mentioning the hypocrisy of that, not at this point. And there are a thousand reasons he’d rather not linger on his messy history with fine, right now, so he decides to change tack. “I really do want to know how your business trip went, you know.”

“Well, it was – not Bad. The scenery up there was very Beautiful, but the rain meant it wasn’t the best time to Visit.”

“And your client?”

“Naturally, they were impressed by my talent and Professionalism. They’ll definitely call for me Again.”

“Will you go, if they do?”

“That depends when it Is.” Natsume throws him a cagey look. “And what else I may or may not be Doing.”

Slightly, very slightly, Tsumugi shifts his hand forward. His knuckles bump lightly against Natsume’s, and then he withdraws. “Please stop worrying. I promised you I’m not going anywhere… and, like I said, I can’t be happy unless you are too.”

“You need to stop tossing out those lines so Easily.” But despite his words, he knocks his fingers against Tsumugi’s in return. And that, more than anything, signals that they’re going to be okay. He takes it as a sign that he can safely change topic, and steers the conversation accordingly.

“Are you planning to stay up much longer? I can make us tea, if you are.”

“No. I don’t intend To, at least out Here. I just wanted to check to make sure Tenshouin hadn’t gotten his claws into you Again, and he doesn’t seem to Have. I suppose I can call myself Satisfied.”

“All right. In that case, I think I’ll go to bed.” He stands, stretches, tries to ignore the feel of his housemate’s eyes on him. “Good night, Natsume.”

“Good Night. Oh, and Senp– Tsumugi?”

He stops in his tracks, glances back over his shoulder. Natsume suddenly seems very, very interested in staring at his hands. “Yes?”

“Happy birthday.”

*

**iii. and skyward**

Tsumugi’s birthday is never a particularly big affair. Maybe because it went so uncelebrated during his childhood – his parents had divorced the week after he turned nine, and the early-August trauma from that had stuck – and he’s never managed to break that habit. Even now, he’s prone to forgetting it, especially when he’s busy. And between Eichi’s party the night before, and Natsume’s love reading, he’s somehow managed to be hyper-conscious about it in the weeks beforehand, but still completely forget about it on the day.

So he doesn’t exactly have plans. Besides, he has work both today and tomorrow, so he can’t really do anything which will interfere with his schedule.

It’s quiet at the agency, at least. He’s actually ahead of himself for once, having made sure to conquer his workload in advance of Eichi’s party, and there’s always less to do during the middle of the week anyway. So he drags himself through the slow morning. Has an impromptu meeting with one of his superiors, which isn’t about anything bad, but does eat his entire lunch hour. It’s uneventful, but his life has been busy enough recently that he doesn’t mind.

(He makes sure to text Eichi again, though, and Hiyori, and Nagisa. And he emerges with plans for two coffee dates and one museum visit, which he needs to transfer to the planner on their fridge once he gets home. It feels right, to be rebuilding those bridges, even if none of them cross the river to his fate.)

The afternoon runs just as predictably as the morning, up until about four, when there’s a commotion by the front desk. Tsumugi, having just reached a particularly fiddly part of the paperwork he’s chipping away at, doesn’t let himself look up, fearing the distraction. Besides, it probably isn’t anything interesting; this may not be a standard office job, considering how often they play host to idols, but he knows his coworkers will still take any excuse for a break. But the murmur of conversation is difficult to tune out, especially when his ears keep picking out a familiar inflection. So at last, he caves, and glances up.

He can’t tell if he’s incredibly surprised, or incredibly unsurprised, to see that they have a visitor, and that it’s Natsume. And that he’s striding through the office like he has some divine purpose. He’s well within his rights to be at the agency, of course; he’s contracted here, after all, even if he’s mostly focusing on his fortune-telling work until Switch can debut properly. It’s just that he never actually comes by.

Tsumugi becomes aware, slowly, that just about everyone else is staring. And why wouldn’t they, when Natsume always cuts such a striking figure? He isn’t even wearing anything particularly flashy today, just one of his usual turtleneck ensembles, but something about him draws the eye regardless. His hair is the one bright thing in the office, the click of his shoes slow and deliberate. And once he comes to a stop, in front of a certain desk, Tsumugi feels every gaze in the office shift onto him. Which is beyond stressful, but he manages to unstick his jaw and speak.

“Oh, Natsume. What brings you here?”

“You know what the occasion Is.” Natsume cocks his head in challenge. “Come On. We’re going Out.”

“I’m in the middle of work, you know. My superiors –”

“I spoke to them Already. And they were more than willing to let one of their hardest-working employees leave early on his Birthday.”

Tsumugi revises his opinion: if Natsume seems like he’s particularly eye-catching, it must just be because he’s back to his usual self. There’s no trace of his previous exhaustion, or weeks-long bad mood. Just the same sharp, self-assured boy who’d become part of him before he’d even realised it. It’s like… well, magic.

“Tsumugi,” Natsume says, eyes narrowed in harsh amusement. And so he’s forced to revise his opinion  _ again_: there is, regardless, something unusually handsome about him today. Or maybe it’s just that Tsumugi’s never heard him say his name like that before. “It’s hardly a difficult Situation. Most people would relish the opportunity to get out of work Early, so hurry up and come with Me.”

He doesn’t even want to fight it, not really. “Just let me finish these forms. I need to have them in by tomorrow morning, so I’ll drop them off with my boss, and then we can go.”

“All Right.” Natsume turns, perches himself on the edge of Tsumugi’s desk. His coworkers are still, absolutely, staring, but it just makes him cross his legs primly and pull out his phone. “Take your Time.”

But the idea of Tsumugi being able to get anything done under these conditions is beyond laughable. Not when Natsume is right there, and acting like himself again, and in a strangely benevolent mood, and when the red fall of his hair against the grey of his turtleneck is like something sublime.

Still, by some miracle, he manages to fumble through the last of his paperwork. One of their interns offers to turn in the forms on his behalf, and then he clocks out early.

It’s a perfect day outside, not too hot or humid for August. The city outside is quieter than it normally is when Tsumugi leaves work, in that strange hour after most high schools end and before most office jobs do. But that means they can walk two abreast, and Natsume falls easily into step with him, hands deep in the pockets of his chinos.

“You seem to be doing better. Have things picked up for you?”

“You might say That,” Natsume says, somehow conveying both absolute smugness and absolute opacity at the same time. It occurs to Tsumugi, in a slow, dawning revelation, that he’s missed him. “Perhaps the planets have aligned for me Again, or perhaps I foresaw something good in the Future, or perhaps I simply slept Well.”

“I’m glad, you know. You’ve seemed so miserable, lately, and it’s hard for me to be happy when you’re miserable.”

“Careful, Now. That almost sounded Selfish.”

“Oh – it did? I’m sorry. You know that wasn’t my intention.”

“I was making a Joke. Really, Senpai, you’re so easy to wind Up.”

Beyond hypocritical, coming from Natsume, but pointing that out probably won’t help anything. Tsumugi tucks the smile that threatens to escape him into a corner of his mouth. “Are we going somewhere in particular? Or are you just planning for us to wander?”

“Well, I’ve made a dinner reservation for us and Sora, but that isn’t until Later. And I don’t have anything planned for you between now and Then. I thought you might appreciate being able to take it a little Easier, Today.”

“I hadn’t really thought about it, to be honest.”

“That’s what you say every Year. And this is your third birthday we’ve spent Together, Now. How many more times will it take for something to Stick?”

Actually, it’s been  _ four _ years since they had met again, but the August of Natsume’s first year had hardly been a time for celebration. “I don’t know. It’s complicated, I think. People’s lives are so busy that I don’t want to bother them, especially because remembering dates can be difficult. And it’s hard to gather people for a celebration when we all move in such different circles, now.”

“So you’ll gladly barge into the lives of Others, but have no expectation that they might want to do the same for You? That isn’t how it works at All. I’m only going to say this Once, because there’s no way you’d ever pick it up Naturally, but it’s fine for you to bother me More. I’m sure many others feel the Same, but it goes double for Me. Because I’m already well and truly stuck with You.”

Despite his harsh words, Natsume’s good mood still bleeds through. It softens the edges of his insults, betrays the shape of the feelings underneath. It’s always a relief whenever he reveals some edge of honesty, some moment of paradox when his words and actions are blatantly in opposition, and not just because it’s usually unintentional. There’s honesty in his usual evasiveness too, but it always feels much less real than something like this.

But all this talk of Tsumugi’s birthday reminds him of something else. Something he should probably address here, something he’s been turning over all morning, as little as he actually wants to bring it up. “Actually, I’ve been wondering. About the love reading, the one which was supposed to come true before I turned twenty –”

“Not today.”

Natsume’s voice warps strangely on those words, and there’s a force to them he doesn’t usually speak with. But then he seems to rein himself in a little, and keeps going. “I understand that you’re preoccupied by It, but there’s a time and place for worrying about these Things.”

“I can agree with you about the time, I think, but as for place… we aren’t really anywhere, or going anywhere right now.”

“I suppose that’s True. In that Case, shall we go where the wind takes Us?”

“You know I’d go anywhere, with you.”

Natsume scowls and aims an incredibly slow kick at him, which Tsumugi dodges with ease. “I’m only letting you say something that uselessly sentimental because it’s your Day.”

As if Natsume isn’t mostly sentiment himself. As if, despite everything, part of him isn’t still a creature of the past. That part of him isn’t still in the secret room beneath the Yumenosaki library, or that part of him isn’t still an Oddball first and foremost, or that part of him didn’t burn to ashes along with the records of fine’s wrongdoings, beneath the autumn starlight.

(Tsumugi still remembers the way their fingers had brushed when he’d taken that envelope. The way Natsume’s hands had been shaking, and had stilled, momentarily, against his fingertips.) 

Still, it doesn’t seem to drag him down as badly as it used to. Or, at the very least, his past has finally scarred over, and evolved from memory into sentiment. And that’s one thing they’ve come to share, ever since their paths crossed over and kept crossing: burning the past as a source of fuel for the future. Like the fusion taking place inside a star, transforming the old into the new, hydrogen and helium and heat and light.

“You’re thinking something weird Again, aren’t You.”

He comes back to himself more sharply than he should. “No, not really.”

“You can’t lie to me and expect me to believe it that Easily. If you want to know what gave the game Away, it was the particularly insufferable look on your Face.”

“What kind of face was I making, exactly?”

“I told You. The kind of face made by someone caught up in the Past, having nostalgic thoughts with no bearing on Reality.”

“Oh, no, that isn’t the case. I promise I’m completely in the present. Actually, I don’t think there’s anywhere I’d rather be right now than here.”

“There you go Again, with such a vulgar display of Emotion. Just like Always, you’re all Talk, but don’t follow Through.”

“I’m following through right now, though. You know, the common thread in all my sentimentality is you, and I’d like to think I’ve stayed by your side enough to prove it.”

Natsume makes an indecipherable expression, and then shifts through about five more. “We didn’t meet long enough ago for you to be this Sappy.”

“Maybe. But it feels like you were gone for a long time, and it’s good to have you back.”

“It’s good to be Back. And I mean That. Because, for a while There, I wasn’t sure if I would ever be able to go home Again.”

“I didn’t realise so much was at stake this time,” he says honestly. “I know it’s still too much to expect you might have told me, and I don’t want to push you. But… what happened to change things? What made you realise you could still come back?”

The corner of Natsume’s smile spells out countless mysteries. “That’s a Secret.”

And they continue on like that, swept out by the summer breeze.

*

A week after Tsumugi’s twentieth birthday, Natsume knocks on his door and invites himself in without waiting for an answer. He looks uncharacteristically serious, shoulders hunched and arms folded, and it carries a strange, tense energy. And, considering the good mood which has seemed to buoy him through the past few days, this sharp break absolutely cannot bode well at all.

“We need to Talk.”

Tsumugi desperately reshuffles the papers on his desk, sorting them into a vague semblance of order, and spins in his chair to face him. He’s more or less done with this set of documents anyway, but his brain is a little fuzzy from staring at them for so long. “All right. Do you want to sit down?”

“Fine.” Natsume crosses the room to sit on the bed, and Tsumugi, in the desperate hope he isn’t overstepping, copies him. “Well, I’ll spare us both and cut directly to the Chase. It’s about the love Reading.”

“Right. Um, you mean because it didn’t seem to come true? Because I’ve been thinking about that, and I really don’t mind. I still trust you as a fortune teller, of course, but like I said… I’m not sure I ever fully believed that destiny was mine, anyway.”

“Well, some of what you’re saying isn’t entirely off Base, but No. I mean that I got it Wrong.”

“Huh?”

“I Said,” Natsume repeats, looking like he’d rather be anywhere but here, “that I got it Wrong. There was no truth to anything I told You, because I couldn’t see your destiny Clearly.”

It seems almost impossible, though: not just the idea that Natsume could have made a mistake in his reading, but that he’s here and owning up to it. He’s grown since they first met in high school, but vulnerability still doesn’t come easily to him, especially when there’s this much at stake. “But… I thought you were an expert.”

“I Am! I just got Unlucky, kind Of. It helps if you think of looking into the future like using a Telescope, trying to pick out a certain Constellation. Even though my powers are more like a telescope at an observatory than one you could use at Home, and even though I was definitely focusing in the right Direction, even the most powerful machine is useless if it gets enough dust on the Lens.”

“And, uh… that happened when you tried to read for me?”

“It Did. The reading I gave you was merely the dust in this Analogy, and there’s a simple Explanation. A fortune teller can’t read his own Future, not only because there are rules against It, but also because it’s Impossible. As watchers at the crossroads of Destiny, our own lives are so nebulous and uncertain that they can’t be seen Properly. And for the most powerful of Us, it can spread to affect on the people we intersect with Often. So because I have some involvement in your Life, that threw things Off.”

All right, that… sounds like something which could theoretically be true. He’s never encountered anything like that in all his reading about fortune telling, but he’s also the less qualified party here. “Right,” he says, trying to sound more steady than he feels.

“After you brought it Up, I finally decided to ask mommy about It. Because I’ve never failed at a reading Before, let alone so Drastically, and it’s been bothering me Since. And she said it means our destinies are the Same, or at least Overlap.”

“I knew that, though. Because we live together, and because of Switch, and because –”

“This was never about Switch! It’s far more significant than anything like That. Did you know that my parents met Because, when my daddy called mommy in to consult her about his Prosperity, the same thing Happened? Even though she was a powerful fortune Teller, the reading came back hazy and Inconclusive. She couldn’t read his Future, because she  _ was _ his Future.” He laughs, but there’s something deeply unamused about it. “Although she was much older than eighteen when it happened to  _ Her_.”

Tsumugi’s throat goes completely dry. “Oh.”

“And then I started thinking about It. And I arrived at the conclusion That… you might be Useless, but you aren’t so useless you couldn’t become Mine.”

“Um… in that case, I’m sorry you’ve been saddled with someone like me.”

“No, shut Up, that came out all Wrong.” Natsume huffs and straightens his shoulders. “What I meant Is, you might be Slow, but you’ve always been kind to Me. And you work Hard, and you’re always Honest, and you haven’t let yourself get stuck in the Past. And you’d probably even be handsome if you cut your hair short Again, or at least got it Styled.”

That’s a lot of truth, all at once. Tsumugi somehow manages to unstick his jaw to answer, but the words get scrambled between his brain and his mouth, and what comes out is: “You think I’m handsome?”

“That isn’t the  _ Point_!”

“I know, I know! Anyway, it’s selfish, but I was going to say before you interrupted – I know we’re going in the same direction, because we’ve always been bound together by fate. I don’t have to be able to read my future to know it leads to you.”

“Then,” Natsume says, sliding in a little closer, “all questions of fate and destiny Aside: how do you feel about Me?”

There’s hardly enough space between them to breathe, let alone think. But, still, Tsumugi tries to probe his feelings. He cares, of course, both as a friend and as a member of the same idol unit, and has for years. His hair, long enough to skim the bottom of his shoulderblades, is the proof of that. But it’s hard to quantify those feelings, to weigh up whether or not they might be romantic. The only ballpark he has is from another time, when he was another self entirely, and the kind of feelings he’d held for Eichi don’t seem anything at all like the kind of feelings he’d theoretically hold for Natsume. Even during their time together in fine, Eichi had always been so far away; but this is Natsume, who’s so much closer, who he’s known for years, who works with him and lives in his house and leaves dirty mugs in the sink overnight when he’s stayed up too late to have the energy to wash them. Theoretically, his feelings for Natsume would look nothing like the flash of a comet passing by, but hell if Tsumugi knows how they  _ would_.

“I don’t know,” he says honestly. “I know I care about you, and I know I want our happiness to be the same, and I know I want to stay with you as long as you’ll have me. But I don’t know if any of that is romantic.”

Natsume – deflates. And then he’s out of Tsumugi’s space, and impossibly far away. “It’s Fine,” he says. “The connection doesn’t strictly have to be Romantic, it’s just the most common Form. And since you swore me a life Debt, it’s understandable that we’re bound by destiny Regardless. That’s All.”

“But, if I’m understanding correctly… you’d  _ like _ it to be romantic?”

A deafening silence drops into place, so absolute that Tsumugi thinks he can hear the humming of the fan in the main room. Natsume looks genuinely aghast, and he scrambles to fix it.

“Did I say something wrong? I can understand if that felt like it was presuming too much –”

“I can’t believe You,” Natsume says at last. “Yes, I  _ would _ like it to be Romantic! Why do you think I was so unhappy about the result of the reading in the first Place? Or about letting you go to Tenshouin’s stupid Party, knowing how hard you always try for Him, even though he’s never deserved It? And… I was avoiding you because the reading suggested my feelings would never meet Yours, so I was trying to smother them the only way I Could. This was supposed to be a Confession, you Know. But you’ve given me your Answer, and I’ve made a fool of myself a million times Over, so I’ll leave it Be. Just… forget any of this ever Happened, all Right?”

Something in Tsumugi’s brain clicks to a complete halt. It’s just like Natsume to approach these things in a completely roundabout fashion, only reaching the point at the very end. Because he’s surprisingly clumsy too, in his own way, and surprisingly avoidant for someone who comes off so blunt, and Tsumugi wants to keep learning more and more about him – and that means he can’t let things end like this.

“But I can’t do that, and I don’t want to either. I thought we agreed we’d stop wanting to return to the past, and face the future together.”

“That was about something completely Different. You aren’t allowed to use my own words against Me.”

“I know, but – please, listen to me. Because I might not love you at the moment, but I think if I could feel something like that again, it’d be for you.”

“Shut up.”

“Huh?”

“I told you to shut Up. Because I could deal with Rejection, but don’t you dare give me Pity.”

“This isn’t pity, Natsume. I wouldn’t say it if I didn’t believe it. And I want to be in love with you.”

Natsume casts a long, long look at him, and Tsumugi looks back and allows himself to be seen. “Why?”

“Like I said, you’re… my future. And I want to be yours, as well. And even though we’re this close, you still come off a little lonely, somehow. And I’d like to be the reason you aren’t.”

“Then…” He rallies, squares his shoulders. “Then, if you really mean It… hurry up and fall for me.”

Natsume’s words are often at odds with his actions, but this time, not even his usual tone can disguise the raw hurt carved into him. And Tsumugi’s been rejected before, too, even if this is a much softer one in comparison. Even if it’s a  _ not yet _ rather than a  _ not ever_, it feels like poor compensation for everything he’s been given. He might not know what their happiness will look like, in a year or two or five, but he knows it doesn’t look like this.

So he shuffles forward, bed shifting under his weight, and draws Natsume into his arms. It’s an awkward embrace, but Natsume sinks into the touch. They’ve lived together for months and worked together for years, but they almost never make physical contact – one too prickly, the other too unwilling to push it – and never as much as this. Only an occasional adjustment during practice, the incidental nudge of their hands as they wash dishes or pass through each other’s space.

So Natsume’s shape is new against him, the contours of his back unmapped territory, the heat of his body strangely intoxicating. He smells – warm, mostly. With an undercurrent of one of the colognes he favours in summer, not too heavy on the palate. Tsumugi tucks his face into the soft scent of his hair.

“I will.”

“You’re the Worst,” Natsume informs him, nose pressed against his shoulder. Despite his words, he doesn’t pull away. “It’s unfair to say that you don’t love Me, and then to hold me like This.”

“I know, and I’m sorry. But – please wait for me just a little longer. I know I’ve always been chasing after you, but this time, I’ll catch up for sure.”

“You had Better. Or I’ll never forgive you for the rest of my Life.”

Gently, Tsumugi smooths a hand up the curve of his spine. It makes Natsume shift a little in his arms. “If it helps, I don’t think I could forgive myself either.”

“It Doesn’t.”

“Well, I wouldn’t want to make us both miserable. So, like I said, please just be patient, and I promise I’ll come to meet you. If I work hard enough, even I can make it there.”

“All Right.” Natsume settles more comfortably against him, pure heat. “All right.”

*

The day of Sora’s next live dawns bright and not too hot, the sky all streaky cloud. Tsumugi’s glad for it; turnout for lives tends to be much lower on rainy days, the prospective audience unwilling or unable to attend in such gloomy weather, and Sora deserves every last spectator he can get.

He and Natsume have both promised to attend, of course. Still, it’s strange to be back at Yumenosaki again, as an adult rather than a student. It isn’t his first return visit, but it doesn’t get any more comfortable with time. If anything, he actually feels even more out of place every time he comes back. Like he’s outgrown this place, the same way he might have outgrown a pair of shoes, and try as he might, he can never go back to fitting them.

Still: part of him will remain at Yumenosaki. Maybe not always, but for a long time yet.

He meets Natsume at the front gate, a little after the last period of the day would be starting. His housemate’s in a turtleneck, of course, sleeves rolled up, even though it’s closer to summer than winter. It looks black from a distance, but as Tsumugi approaches, the colour resolves itself into a very dark blue. There’s something arresting about seeing him in a softer shade than normal – or maybe, at this point, Tsumugi would be arrested by just about anything Natsume does.

“There you Are.” Natsume doesn’t bother with any kind of greeting, turning to him as if they’d seen each other not five minutes ago. “You made it on Time.”

“You thought I wouldn’t? I’m a little hurt, you know.”

“Not Exactly. But your office is far Away, and you might have gotten caught in Traffic.”

“When I read my horoscope this morning, it said I was supposed to have bad luck with travel today. So I made sure to leave work early to avoid that.”

“I don’t think crossing a single city counts as that kind of Travel. Still, while I appreciate the Effort, now we’re both here Early.”

“I’m sure we can find some way to manage to pass the time.”

“Well, since we have much longer than expected before the Live… Shall we look around Campus?”

Tsumugi hasn’t been here since Switch’s last performance in Natsume’s third year, and even then, there’d been too much else happening to take it in. But now that he thinks about it, it might be nice to wander Yumenosaki with the benefit of distance. With the benefit of knowing that nobody here remembers Eichi’s revolution, and that only the current third-years might have even heard of it. And with the benefit of the pair of them looking like they could be any alumni, returning to watch a friend perform, and not two chess pieces in a bloody war, united when they were taken off the board and set aside.

“That might be nice.”

“Let’s get Going, Then.”

There’s a security guard at the gate – this is a school for idols, after all – but he remembers them both, and lets them through with visitor passes. With the students still in class, campus is dead silent. The pair of them make their way through the main entrance, and along the main walkway, without seeing evidence of a single other soul. It’s a little uncanny seeing the school like this so early in the day, when Tsumugi associates this kind of quiet with leaving after a late night of work, or with the silence and fear of the war.

“Did you have a destination in Mind?”

It’s a blessing that Natsume cuts in, before he can get too caught up thinking like that. “Well, I’d like to visit the library… and the underground archives, and the secret room. It’s true that the library committee doesn’t exist any more, and the task of running it passed to the student council, but hopefully they won’t mind if we visit.”

“The student council president is supposed to be one of Sora’s Friends, so maybe he’ll let it Slide. Even if he’s also the one in charge of Fine.”

“The new fine isn’t anything like the old one, you know. They might operate under the same name, and perform the same kind of music, but they’ve become a completely different unit. Sora told me that a couple of first-years joined last year, and some did this year too – well, the ones that were up to Himemiya’s standards did. Because they truly, from the bottom of their hearts, wanted to be a part of fine. And they don’t have anything to do with… well, with everything.”

“Hmm. I suppose that’s True. Although, if they decided to stay together as a Unit, they could at least have changed their name to something without terrible Associations.”

“But its associations aren’t terrible for Himemiya. Or for its junior members, or for its fans. This reborn fine will keep performing, and connecting with more and more people, until someday the past will be buried underneath the present. Until fine will have brought more good into the world than bad. Not that it’ll ever erase what we – what  _ I _ – did under that name, but maybe it’ll come to matter less.”

“I…” Natsume makes a face, and comes to a stop. His expression is unusually serious, the lines of his eyebrows harsh against his skin, but his gaze is thoughtful. “I’ll never like Tenshouin, or forgive him Either, but it’s true that I don’t hurt as much any More. Which doesn’t mean I’m agreeing with You, Though. Because even if it comes to matter Less, I don’t think it’ll ever stop mattering at All. But… the world is bigger than Fine, and the Oddballs. It’s far bigger now than it was when I was Fifteen. And it would be foolish to spend so long obsessing over the village where I grew up that I never venture beyond its Gates.”

Tsumugi weighs that all up, but no matter how much he thinks it over, it seems to point to the same conclusion. “That makes it sound like you  _ mostly  _ agree, though.”

“Even if I Do, the nuance is Important. And the point I’m trying to make Is, the best way to have my revenge on Tenshouin is to let the past Die, and grow into the most brilliant idol I Can. To have him know that I was stronger than anything he or fine did to Me.” Natsume’s lips twitch into a tiny smirk. “And I suppose that counts as my revenge on You, Too.”

“That doesn’t make any sense, though. Do you want to have your revenge on me, or do you want me to love you? I know you always send mixed messages, but they aren’t normally this mixed.”

“You’re thinking far too Small, as Usual. Because – wouldn’t making you fall for me be the greatest revenge I could possibly Enact? To have the former leader of fine at my beck and Call, until I grow tired of It, and decide to release you from my Spell?”

“I don’t know, would it? I thought revenge was supposed to be unpleasant. But like I said before, I want my feelings to be the same as yours, so I think I’d welcome it more than anything.”

Natsume hunches his shoulders, tucks his chin into his chest. “That’s because you have a seriously twisted Personality. Don’t try and pin your masochism on Me, when it’s not even slightly my Fault.”

Well, he can’t really debate that. They step into the school building in companionable silence, linger in the entryway as they trade their outdoor shoes for slippers. But there’s something else Tsumugi still wants to tell him, something important, in a moment he can’t let pass.

“Hey, Natsume.”

He doesn’t even glance up from where he’s changing his shoes. “Yes?”

“I don’t think you’re going to like hearing this, especially from me, but… still, let me indulge myself, and say that I’m proud of you. For coming this far, when it might have been easy not to. Because I probably don’t tell you that enough.”

Natsume finishes adjusting his shoes, casts a look from under his fringe. His eyes are flat, golden mirrors. “You’re really stupid Sometimes, you Know?”

“Huh?”

“All Right, that was too harsh of Me, so I should Rephrase. I meant that you’re being Ridiculous, because there’s no Way… that I would ever turn down praise from You.”

“Oh.”

“So, thank You, and I appreciate It – but we should talk about something Else. I didn’t come here to be sentimental on Sora’s big Day. This is supposed to be about our future as Switch, not the past when we were still Scattered.”

“Well, in that case, is there anywhere in particular you’d like to go while we’re here?”

“The same places you Do, I Think. Most of my memories are bound up with the secret Room, and I suppose I can suffer a detour through the library on the Way.”

Tsumugi checks his watch. “We should hurry, then. We don’t have all that long until school finishes.”

“Then you had better lead On.”

So, he does. He doesn’t say anything as they head upstairs, past classroom after classroom, where they keep the pieces of his youth. And he doesn’t say anything when they enter the library, or when they begin to wind their way through its new layout, or when they find the entrance to the underground archives. And he doesn’t say anything when, once they’re finally alone, Natsume’s hand snakes its way into his.

*

**iv. moon flower**

The wanting comes back first.

Of course Tsumugi knows that his sole crush, up to this point, hadn’t been entirely academic. Who could look at Eichi, impossibly beautiful as he was, and be content merely with that? Certainly not Tsumugi, who’d wasted a good deal of his second year staring at the slight bend of his fingers, the sublime curve of his lower lip, the contours of his chest under his fine uniform.

Still, it’s a shock when, curled up in the lounge together one night after dinner, Tsumugi turns his head to look at Natsume and is overcome by how much he  _ wants _ him. Natsume’s been much more touchy lately, although he’s still a little reticent, self-conscious about his hunger to be loved. He really is like a cat in the way he’s been slowly, warily migrating towards an outstretched hand, unsure if it’s more likely to feed or harm him. Tonight they’re pressed up against each other, Natsume right up against Tsumugi’s side and Tsumugi’s arm half around him. And Natsume shifts, and his hair rustles against Tsumugi’s shoulder, and he glances up from under his fringe.

And either he naturally runs warm, or Tsumugi’s just been so cold for so long, but the heat of his body is always fierce in its intensity. But it’s nothing compared to the fire that scorches through Tsumugi’s veins, sudden and hungry and not academic at all.

“You’re Staring,” Natsume says, voice low, and it does something terrible to him.

“I. Yes, I probably am.” The words rush out of him all at once. “Can I kiss you?”

That clearly shocks him, but he rallies, and withdraws behind his usual smug expression. “Does that mean you’ve come to your Senses, and fallen for me Properly?”

“Not yet,” he admits, “but I’d really like to kiss you. I know that’s asking a lot without making any promises, and I don’t expect you to agree or anything. But maybe it counts for something.”

Natsume pulls away a little, the better to convey the force of his frown. “I’m not opposed to the Idea, not Innately. But not right Now.”

“Um… is it a bad time? I’m sorry if I asked without knowing that.”

“Well, the issue isn’t with time so much as it is Timing. I’ll spell it out for You, since I’m sick of you not taking the Initiative, So: the least you could do is romance me First.”

“I thought you didn’t want to give me hints about how to treat you.”

“I Don’t, but you’re so oblivious to the idea of romance you’d never have reached that conclusion on your Own. An entirely hopeless Case.”

“So,” Tsumugi tries, “if I’m understanding properly, you want to go on a date?”

Natsume sniffs. “It’s about time you Asked.”

“It might not be any good, but I’d like that too. To be honest, I don’t have any experience with that kind of thing, and I can’t really promise anything romantic, but I’ll try my best to plan something fun.”

“I’m Aware, Though. I know you don’t have any kind of dating History, and I definitely know that you don’t understand Romance. But you understand a lot about Me, So… I’m trusting you to be able to get it Right.”

“Okay. But, if we’re making requests of each other… maybe you could try be a bit more straightforward, too? I know you’re a kind person at heart, and I know it might be too much to ask you to be honest all the time, but I might get the wrong idea if you keep going like you have been.”

“I told you I liked You, Though. And that’s still True, no matter what else I might Say.”

“Natsume,” he says, a little more firmly, “please?”

“You know it’s difficult for me to speak plainly about these Things.”

“I do, but I need to feel like things have changed too. Like we aren’t still going in circles all the time. I’m sorry if this isn’t romantic either, but I don’t want you to have to go another three weeks without feeling like you can talk to me. You don’t have to be honest about your feelings, but… please, at least be honest about your pain.”

“It might not be Romantic, but it’s still Important. Either Way, Though, I don’t want to burden you with my Issues.”

“It won’t be a burden.”

“That doesn’t sound True. Especially considering how much you already put up with Me.”

“Even if all you did was complain, all day and every day, I’d still be happy to be of use to you. And when you think about it in the context of everything you give me, it’s not a burden at all.”

“It’s probably too much of a lost cause by Now, but stop being so self-sacrificing for Once. I know you have your own Problems, Too. And I don’t want to add to them even a Little.”

“Yes, I do. But when my problems start to bother me, I’d like to be able to speak to you about them as well, no matter how big or small. Even if… whatever this is between us… doesn’t work out, we’re still a team.”

Natsume curls in closer to him with a small huff. “Fine. You’ve made your Point. In that Case, I suppose that if you’re Trying, I might be able to find it in myself to try as Well. Progress might be Slow, but I want to make the Effort.”

“Thank you. It means a lot that you’re willing to hear me out.”

“Then I suppose I should also thank you for agreeing to a Date, even though it’s outside of your realm of Knowledge.” Tsumugi finds himself skewered by that golden gaze, now glittering with amusement. “I’m expecting you to sweep me off my Feet, of Course. Let’s meet next Sunday, Senpai. I’ll be Waiting.”

*

“To be honest,” Tsumugi admits, when they convene on Sunday evening, sitting across each other at the dining-room table again, “I couldn’t think of anything.”

Unfortunately, it’s true. But not for lack of trying: he’d spent most of the week trying to make a plan, applying himself to researching date locations with the same fervour he’d once pored through the entirety of the Yumenosaki library. Although there are classics, when it comes to dates, and he’d run into a million different ideas, none of them had seemed like the right fit for Natsume. They’re both terrible at sitting through movies, although for different reasons; they eat together all the time, so getting dinner wouldn’t exactly feel out of the ordinary; the weather forecast suggests it’ll be too hot to be outside, which rules out a lot of options, and Natsume would usually much rather be indoors anyway. No matter what he had considered, nothing had been good enough.

He braces himself for the anger, but it doesn’t come. Natsume looks more curious than anything, although the cut of the lines of his face suggests he’s on the edge of annoyance. “Explain, Then. Because, for all your Flaws, I can’t believe something like this would slip your mind Entirely.”

“Well, I thought of a lot of things, actually, but none of them were right. We spend so much time together anyway, that nothing I could come up with seemed special enough. And my ideas that did… hardly seemed worthy of you.”

“Is that So,” Natsume says, and then, “Actually, considering you’re such a creature of Sentiment, I was sure you were going to suggest Karaoke.”

“I… no. Somehow, it didn’t even cross my mind.”

“Well, I might not have Minded, if you’d Asked.”

“Does that mean you actually want to go, or just that I should keep it on the shortlist? You talk so confusingly sometimes.”

“I meant what I Said, but that isn’t the Point. As much as I appreciate the Effort, you’ve completely overthought This, and you didn’t have To. A nice dinner will be Fine.”

“I can do that. Do you feel like having anything in particular?”

“A place in the city centre I’m interested in opened up Recently. They specialise in fusion Cuisine, and I’ve heard only good Things. Also, you’re Paying.”

“That seems fair. I do still owe you for the love reading, after all.”

Natsume makes a disgruntled face. “Don’t be Ludicrous. You know the reading wasn’t even Correct. It would be bad form to charge you for it Now, and bad taste to have you repay it under these Circumstances.”

“It was supposed to be a joke.”

“Don’t quit your day Job, Senpai.”

“I wouldn’t even dream about it.”

“Stop trying to salvage this Conversation,” Natsume says, “because you aren’t going To, and take me Out.”

The date itself goes… surprisingly well, considering it’s Tsumugi’s first, and also Tsumugi’s. He’d half expected some run of terrible fortune to sink him completely, even though none of his horoscopes had suggested disaster, and even though he’d made sure to have today’s lucky item (a pressed flower) on hand at all times. Because as much as he tries to be an optimist, an awful lot of things have gone right for him lately, and surely there has to be some pushback.

But it isn’t awful. It’s good, even. They find the restaurant without too much trouble, and manage to secure a good table. And the food is delicious, and the conversation flows smoothly, and Natsume doesn’t seem to suddenly decide he isn’t interested. (Which, despite the fact Tsumugi knows they wouldn’t have made it this far if his affection was volatile, still feels like a real threat.) And even though this feels like something they might do normally, the knowledge that it’s a  _ date _ buzzes hungrily under his skin. Heightens the experience, so that every one of Natsume’s remarks, every one of his sideways glances, seems to promise multitudes.

And if Natsume holds his hand under the table, or sits so close to him on the train home that their legs are pressed against each other – well, maybe that’s starting to feel like something normal too.

“I don’t feel like going home just Yet,” Natsume admits, under the washed-out lights of their local train station. The confession makes him fidget, fingers curling against his palm, and Tsumugi wants to take his hand more than he’s ever wanted anything. But they’re still idols, and they aren’t alone, so he has to make himself tamp down that impulse. “If we Do… it feels like this spell will End.”

“Me neither.”

“Then… maybe we should never go Back. Maybe we should just spend the rest of time on the same Date. Like a happy dream you can never wake From, or a powerful illusion that can never be Broken. You should just let me ensnare You, Senpai, and give yourself over to me Completely.”

“That might be romantic, but it doesn’t seem very practical. Besides, even if we go home and call things there, I’m not actually going to stop being interested in you.”

“I Wonder.”

“Natsume… You don’t really think that’s going to happen, do you?”

“Mm, not Exactly. But – doesn’t this feel like the kind of thing that isn’t supposed to happen to Us? Going on a normal Date, like normal People, who aren’t always wounding each Other? If we go Back, I can’t shake the feeling that things are going to stop being this Simple. That, Suddenly, you and I will never be able to connect Again.”

Tsumugi takes a deep breath. “I understand, I think. But I won’t let that be the case, now or ever. I know I’m repeating myself, but I want to keep talking to you. I want us to feel like we can tell each other anything, rather than suffering by ourselves. Most of all, I want to come to love you so we can stop hurting each other. Or, even if that’s an impossible standard to hold myself to, I want to be in a place where I can help you far more than I hurt you. I can’t guarantee that I’ll get it right, but I’d like to have the chance.”

“Hm.” Natsume turns on his heel, looks back over his shoulder. “Well, Whatever. I know I’m being Ridiculous. But, even though I still don’t feel ready to head Back, standing on a train platform isn’t much Better.”

So they stop by a park on the way back from the station, and sit together on the grass. The place is one of their usual haunts – it’s not uncommon for Tsumugi to pass it on his way home from work, in the cooler seasons, and find Natsume on one of the benches – but it feels different, somehow, under the summer sky. It’s still warm out, but there’s enough of a breeze that it softens the worst of the humidity. There’s something nostalgic about being together, out here, alone except for the wind and the streetlights. Something he can’t quite pin down until he closes his eyes, traces the memory behind the dark of his lids. A memory of heat and light, and the thick taste of ash, and the first thing he’d ever felt that he knew was real, and Natsume, and the endless night sky.

“We made a promise, on an evening like this.”

Natsume doesn’t look at him, instead tipping his head up into the starlight. He’s heart-achingly beautiful like this, the streaks in his hair dyed silver, the moonflower he’s always been. “Which One?”

“That we’d watch over Yumenosaki together. And that I’d owe you my life until you got tired of it.”

“So we Did.”

The night wind ruffles Tsumugi’s fringe, carries the far-off scent of smoke to his palate. He can’t tell if it’s real or just imagined, but Natsume’s leg pressed against his is impossibly real, as warm as any flame and twice as cleansing. A comfortable silence sets in, between them. Maybe he could fall asleep, here, and wake again, and find Natsume still with him, in an endless dream.

“But we can let go of that promise,” Natsume says suddenly, “can’t we? Our dream – our miracle as Switch – isn’t about Yumenosaki any more. And you don’t need to owe me your life, because destiny already binds us together. So, haven’t we outgrown it?”

His words carry weight, and he isn’t wrong. There’s always been much more to their relationship than one promise, on a night where they threw themselves into the fire and emerged reborn; or even than their other, older pledge, when they had sworn to always return to each other. But still: Tsumugi can’t find it in himself to let that go.

“We can cast that aside, if you’d like. But if we do, I want to make another vow in its place.”

“Why? You know you and I are each other’s Fate.”

“Maybe, but – only because I promised myself we’d meet again. Even if destiny laid out my path, that promise was why I chose to come and meet you.”

Natsume casts him a long look, eyes slightly narrowed. “You’ve Changed,” he says, at last.

Tsumugi shrugs, a little self-conscious under the rare compliment. “Only because I had the opportunity to change with you. Because you saw value in me, even if you weren’t honest about it, and it made me want to grow to meet that.”

“You’re still far too straightforward about saying these kinds of Things. But I’ll allow it this Time, because that was almost Romantic. And, since you’ve proven your Sincerity, I’ll also allow you to kiss me Now.” He tucks a section of his bangs behind one ear. “But, if you do – you have to promise to keep changing. That’s the new vow I want us to make.”

He’s no fortune teller, but for a moment, he thinks he sees the shape of the man Natsume will yet become. And he really, truly, wants to be there to see every second of it. It’s true that destiny will drag them forward together, no matter what. But, regardless: he wants this. To keep having these feelings drawn out of him, more and more. To see who the pair of them will bloom into, together and apart. To be there to meet each and every new Natsume, as he grows, and to meet him as each and every new Tsumugi in turn.

His mouth is suddenly dry, and his hands are shaking. And golden eyes, almost glowing in the moonlight, meet his own.

“Why are you looking at me like That?” Natsume glares at him, poised like he’s ready to run away. “Is there a reason you haven’t taken me up on my Offer? I’ll never forgive you if you’ve changed your mind about kissing Me, you Know. I’ll lay curses on you as long as you Live, to make sure nobody else ever wants You.”

“I haven’t changed my mind! Really, I haven’t. It’s just – Natsume, I think I might be in love with you.”

Natsume opens his mouth, only to snap it shut right after. “You shouldn’t say things you don’t Mean.”

“I mean it, though. Or, at least, I don’t think there’s any other explanation for the way you make me feel.”

“Well, setting explanations Aside – how do you Know, all of a Sudden? Isn’t that a little too Convenient?”

It’s a good question. There’s no reason he should know; no reason the realm of his understanding should have shifted so drastically. Because his feelings for Eichi might have been like a comet passing by, two different trajectories lining up only once, a single bright flash fading into nothing, but his feelings for Natsume aren’t like that at all. They’re far more like the light from a distant star; always there, but taking years to reach him.

“I’m not sure,” he says honestly. “I just do. You know I’ve always been a little slow, especially about things that matter.”

“This isn’t the time to put yourself Down. If the facts seem good enough for You, they’re good enough for Me – but aren’t you going to prove It?”

“I mean, I would like to. But you’re being kind of needy, Natsume.”

“I am Not. And I don’t need to hear that from someone who can’t read the mood at All, Either. So be quiet for a Second, will You?”

Natsume grabs him by the lapel and  _ yanks_, and then – well, they’re kissing. But their mouths connect at a weird angle, and it hits Tsumugi, about three seconds in, that he’s never kissed anyone before, and he doesn’t know enough about Natsume’s past entanglements to know if he has, either. So it doesn’t really feel like anything; it doesn’t set off fireworks in his brain, or butterflies in his stomach, or anything else he should probably be experiencing, even as he moves his lips awkwardly and tries to work out how to make it good. And then Natsume, completely without ceremony, shoves in his tongue, and Tsumugi’s brain whites out.

He has no point of reference for this, none at all. But he never really has, not when it comes to Natsume, and so far they’ve managed to muddle through intact. And when he thinks about it like that, discovering the way their mouths fit together almost seems like the logical next step in their strange, terrifying adventure.

“There.” Natsume wipes his mouth, an unusually inelegant gesture, but he’s radiating a smugness that sits well on him. “Then our new promise is Sealed, Tsumugi. A promise that says you’re definitely Mine.”

“Nn,” Tsumugi tries. He draws in a slow, deep breath, but there’s a part of his mind intent on reminding him that he could be kissing Natsume again instead, and trying to quell it is a losing battle. “I already was, though?”

“Well, now you have to act like It. If you’re going to be my Boyfriend, and uphold our new vow to each Other, you’ll need to stop being so Impossible.”

“To be honest, I think me being impossible goes all the way down… but I can definitely try. And I can, um.” He exhales. “I can definitely be your boyfriend, too.”

“All Right, but just to make Sure: you  _ do _ want This, don’t You? I’m only asking because I know you always tell people what they want to Hear, and not because I’m worried or Anything.”

“So you really are worried?”

“No, of course Not.”

“Natsume.”

“Fine! Fine, I Am. Maybe you’re just taking this because it’s the path of least Resistance, or because you think destiny means you have To.” He sighs sharply through his teeth. “I know you aren’t the type to just nod along to everything any More, but… I don’t Know. Like I was saying back at the Station, it doesn’t seem like things are ever that easy between Us.”

“Well, then maybe I could keep proving it? I still don’t know much about how this is supposed to work, but love seems like something you’re supposed to keep proving, instead of just having it happen once. And I’m happy to try and do that, however you’d like me to.”

“Then – you’ll need to spoil Me. Take me on Dates, and buy me Flowers, and hold my Hand, and kiss me More, and keep telling me you love Me, but only if you mean It.” He swallows. “And you should definitely take me to Bed. Eventually.”

Tsumugi’s whole body suddenly feels impossibly dry. “I’d be honoured.”

“You had Better. I’d be disappointed if… if the boy I Like, who claims to like me Back, didn’t want to sleep with Me.”

Natsume’s cute even when he’s being evasive, but Natsume being honest about his feelings is devastatingly so: eyes averted, scowling fiercely, and a flush high on his cheeks. How could Tsumugi ever have thought he didn’t want him?

“You. Um. Probably don’t need to worry about that.”

“Well. Good.”

There’s no real way to follow that up, especially when half of Tsumugi’s brain is doing everything it can to stop the other half from thinking about going to bed with Natsume. And he definitely can’t make eye contact right now, because if he looks at Natsume, while thinking about what it might be like to be over him, under him, learning every inch of his skin, and to know Natsume is having the same thoughts – he might actually combust.

“So,” Natsume says, after what feels like an hour of very intently not looking at each other, “that Aside, you didn’t actually answer the Question. Are you going to prove your feelings to me Properly?”

“I can do that. But the condition is that you have to promise to tell me to stop if you get tired of me. I don’t want to become something that only drags you down, now or ever.”

“If I haven’t tired of you before Now, I probably never Will.”

“Oh. Well, I’m glad, you know. And it’s selfish to feel this way, but I hope you never do.”

“Good. Then you should stop being so far away from Me.”

They’re still fairly close together –  _ because you were kissing_, part of his brain helpfully reminds him, as if there was any chance he’d somehow managed to forget – but he isn’t going to turn down the excuse. So Tsumugi scoots closer, and Natsume flops to rest his head in his lap.

He looks different like this, gravity pulling his hair back, skin exposed and moon-silvered. Tsumugi smooths a hand along the curve of his jaw, marvels at the way he turns his face to meet the touch.

“I love you, you know,” he says, still a little dizzy from the novelty of it. From the novelty of finally being able to put a word and a feeling to what Natsume’s probably always been to him. “I said it already, but… I wanted to say it again, if I’m allowed to repeat myself so soon.”

“...I Know. And you Are. And I won’t let myself forget It. And.”

“And?”

“And you love me… and I, you.”

His breath catches at the magnitude of that confession. But Natsume’s not looking at him, eyes trained further upward, and Tsumugi follows his gaze, knowing better than to make him stress the point. He’s happy, maybe happier than he’s ever been, but he knows he’s the type who can’t hide it. And there’ll be plenty of time to hear it again, after all.

Above them, the stars haven’t changed. And he certainly can’t use them to find north, or name more than a handful, or make any sense of those lights and the spaces between them. But that doesn’t mean there’s no beauty there, or meaning.

“Don’t you think the sky is wonderful tonight?”

“The night sky always Is. But I do Agree, because – after All, this is the map that led us to each Other.”

The light of the moon feels cold on his face, but Natsume’s body is warm where it meets his. And the air is clean and fresh, the wind gentle, the weight of his hair familiar against his back. Far away, whatever fate it is that brought them back here, to a reunion under the same autumn stars, clicks into a perfect loop.

Tsumugi closes his eyes.

**Author's Note:**

> back in february, around the time of wonder game, i was like "haha what if i tried to write natsumugi." which... wasn't supposed to be a six-month, 28k endeavour, but here we are. anyway, HUGE love to all the friends who've had to listen to me talk about it. y'all are free now, and also the best.


End file.
